well im surgical. The amount of time it takes to train a basically competent Surgical HM/Surgical tech is about 8-12 months post-school. than another good year or two to make someone who is great, and ready to go be put in a trauma situation on a ship, or on deployment.It takes a few good years to be experienced enough IMO. But all the time you hear about how the 8483 who only does eyes or ENT ends up doing General trauma in a hospital in the sand. How OR RNs end up having to orientate and train corpsman in country in how to do their job or in other operational environments.

Why? Not enough experienced HM for the NEC stay in to fill operational billets. Or they promote out of doing the grunt work.

Same issue happens with our RNs and MDs. Really shitty retention for good medical personnel all around. The good ones who stay in naturally pick up rank and fall out of doing patient care. While the good ones who can make the best impact at the patient care level, but might not want to be a leader or isn't fitting for them, get out or end up being "that OIC" or "that SEL/PO1/Chief".