43HX - PUBLIC HEALTH OFFICER AFSC Officer

Summary

Caring for the health of our Airmen also means helping preclude illness before it can affect our community. Public Health Officers apply public health, preventive medicine, and medical entomology knowledge, techniques, and skills to promote health and reduce the incidence of communicable/zoonotic/vector-borne diseases, occupational and environmental illnesses and injuries, food-borne diseases, and disease and non-battle injuries while in-garrison and deployed. Public Health Officers constantly monitor conditions and potential health threats. These specialists promote public health through epidemiological surveillance of health and disease trends in populations, as well as monitoring food safety practices, and sanitation levels in public and food service facilities.

What You’ll Do

• Apply preventive and public health techniques to reduce the risk of illness both in the United States and overseas.
• Develop, plan and implement public health activities.
• Establishes and maintains liaison with other medical treatment facility personnel and local public health agencies to ensure an integrated public health program.
• Direct and conduct food safety, entomology, and public facility sanitation programs.
• Provide medical intelligence to leadership to help make informed operational decisions as well as to members deploying to reduce disease incidence and promote mission effectiveness.
• Conducts preventive medicine communicable disease control, occupational health, food protection (food safety and food defense), expeditionary site surveys, and public health preparedness and emergency response programs.

Duties

• Provide quality patient care and treatment according to specialty.
• Conduct medical examinations and diagnostic procedures.
• Maintain patient medical records and documentation.
• Implement preventive medicine programs and health initiatives.
• Train and supervise medical personnel as required.

Qualifications

• Completion of the basic Public Health Officer (PHO) course and the Contingency Preventive Medicine (CPM) course
• Completion of Officer Training School
• Must be between the ages of 18 and have not reached your 42nd birthday
• Completion of the basic Public Health Officer (PHO) course and the Contingency Preventive Medicine (CPM) course
• Completion of the Operational Entomology Course
• Certification as a DoD Pesticide Applicator through a DoD-approved course
• Completion of Officer Training School
• Must be between the ages of 18 and have not reached your 42nd birthday

Training & Education

How do we transform you from a raw recruit to an expert Airman in this field? From hands-on experience to college credit toward a degree, the path begins here.

Training Stages

• Officer Training School: 8.5 weeks
• Military Training Location: Maxwell AFB, AL

Minimum Education

Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM/VMD) Master of Public Health degree (MPH/MSPH) Note: all applicable degrees must be from accredited institutions and programs and applicants must have/maintain a 3.0 GPA or higher on a 4.0 scale for all applicable degrees.

Components

• Air Force Active Duty
• Air National Guard
• Air Force Reserve