The Best You Can Be

The sun is barely peeking over the horizon at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds, a large US Army base on the Chesapeake Bay in Northern Maryland. Brigadier General William T. Bester, chief of the Army Nurse Corps and commander of the US Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine, has been working in his office for more than an hour. Barely taking the time to sip his coffee and nibble on a breakfast bar, BG Bester – a warm, friendly, and energetic master's prepared registered nurse – looks over his plans for the long day ahead. He is enthusiastic about his work, his day.

As a member of the US Army medical team, BG Bester has cared for ill and injured military personnel, in war zones and stateside, for the past 28 years. Now, as chief of the Army Nurse Corps, he is responsible for the day-to-day operations of the 102-year-old service, which provides patient care for deployed, active and retired service personnel and their families. He oversees 3,381 active duty nurses, and works with more than 10,000 nurses in the army reserves.

A Career of Service

A Duluth, Minnesota native, BG Bester earned a BSN degree at the College of St. Scholastica in Duluth and an MSN at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. He is also a graduate of the US Army nurse anesthetist program at Madigan Army Medical Center in Tacoma, Washington.

"I was the eldest of seven children, so it was difficult for my parents to pay my way through college. I looked at the student Army Nurse Corps program as a way of completing my education," he explains. "I planned to leave the army after my four-year obligation was over, but decided to stay because there were so many opportunities for nurses in the army."

BG Bester's assignments over the past 28 years could be an advertisement for a career as a nurse in the US Army. He has held positions as a staff nurse, nurse anesthetist, chief nurse, instructor, and deputy commander of nursing. He has worked at army bases in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas, Maryland, Virginia, Indiana, Washington, and Kansas, and overseas in Japan, Germany, Hungary, and Bosnia. He became chief of the Army Nurse Corps, a four-year appointed position, in 2000. In March 2002, he was concurrently appointed commander of the US Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine. Previously, he had been the Assistant Surgeon General for the US Army.

Training Nurses

Today, BG Bester, the 21st Chief of the Army Nurse Corps (and the first man to hold the position), sees army nursing "as a challenging career choice with many opportunities for both professional and personal growth." However, the critical nursing shortage throughout North America is affecting the US Army as well.

"There are a limited number of available nurses, so we are working hard to attract them," BG Bester says. "The army does not have its own nursing program, so it recruits nurses who have either earned their BSN degrees, are students in nursing school, or are enlisted members of the army."

Currently, there are three programs in place to attract nurses:

It doesn't end there. "From the start, army nurses have professional and educational opportunities that they would seldom have during the early years of a career in the private sector," says BG Bester. Newly commissioned nurses do not participate in boot camp, but begin their careers by receiving over two months of intensive training in military medicine, army structure and tactics, and the army nurse's role in caring for soldiers and families. They are also trained to manage patients during medical evacuations.

During their first tour of duty, army nurses can attend a specialty nursing course in areas such as critical care, OR, obstetrics/gynecology, or psychiatry. Many nurses, BG Bester points out, even go on to earn master's and PhD degrees in nursing, paid for by the US Army. In fact, close to 100 of the army's nurses are selected each year for graduate and doctoral level educational programs. Army nurses also have the opportunity to travel and work outside the country.

BG Bester acknowledges that "initial salaries are somewhat lower than for nursing positions in the private sector, but in the long run – with annual pay raises, opportunities for rank elevation, and differentials for housing – salaries and benefits easily surpass those of civilian nurses." Retirement benefits are 50% of salary after 20 years of service, and 75% of salary after 30 years of service.

Confounding Stereotypes

The demographics of army nurses are strikingly different from those of civilian nurses. A total of 36% of the army's nurses are males, compared with only 6% of civilian nurses. BG Bester estimates than 18% of army nurses are African-American, as opposed to 6% in the private sector.

Army nurses are being deployed more frequently than ever before. BG Bester notes that between 1950 and 1989, there were only 10 deployments of army nurses; from 1990 to 2002, there have been 35. "Nurses on our medical teams have to be ready to move quickly, to go wherever they are needed."

Forget the outrageous shenanigans of nurse 'Hot Lips' Houlihan and the military doctors in the television series M*A*S*H, or cardboard stereotypes of unsympathetic military nurses. According to BG Bester: "Army nurses are among the best trained in the world. Wherever we work, our first priority is quality patient care."

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