That’s correct actually, it was asthma. But the last prescribed inhaler was 5 years ago. The issue with that is, there were none prescribed after the cut off age except for that one, and no refills just a one-time thing.
He says his doctor prescribed it as a precaution, and based on the pharmacy records and his physical aptitude, that seems true. Which is messed up.
Even if it was for active symptoms, 5 years without medicine should logically say they’re good right? And we allow people to stay in after they get asthma during service, so what’re we doing really.
If he can score 550 on the ACFT, there should be more nuance applied.
I find it a bit strange how much more difficult it is to join the Army now, in a recruiting crisis. When the Army at one point was the easiest branch to join as long as you had all your limbs, and didn't have an active murder warrant.
They’ve refused to believe genesis is an issue because it’s just “enforcing the standard”, and anyhting less would admit we’ve been faking it for 30 years.
Take a whole brigade, see if genesis finds anything we didn’t know before. Give em all amnesty.
They don’t want to admit it we gamed rhe system for years.
Faking it for 30 years? People have been lying about the requirements since requirements were invented!
I say, return to those Second World War standards. If they were good enough to clobber the Nazis they're good enough for today.
Yeah WW2 standards is where it’s at. Even before genesis I saw dudes in boot camp getting a boot camp medical discharge because they found out they have some random medical condition that’s honestly irrelevant. Like they would make it halfway through marine boot camp and then oh you have some weird liver thing no one has ever heard of even though you’re a PT stud and have a good head on your shoulders. Yeah sorry no can do.
Part of the problem is some conditions you can serve with but not join with. My wife developed asthma while in the service. It made her non deployable but after some treatment she may have even been able to deploy on some conditions. But she was able to keep serving, she just chose to move on from the military.
There was a thread earlier this month about how health conditions of current service members can/will DQ you for OCS/Warrant/Green to Gold.
You can be broken as an NCO. but not as an Officer Candidate? Seems to be cursory, callow, and subjective
It caught me when I tried to go for flight medic and had the flight physical. I stopped taking my prescribed adhd medication in order to pass. The TMC NCOIC was like “are you SURE you’re not taking anything???” I knew I’d been had at that point and fessed up. It’s always a first time no go, but “where there’s a will, there’s a waiver”.
It's been gamed to the point that I met a recruiter with active asthma. Moderate asthma can be managed with allergy medicine which is how she got through basic. She's retired now.
But this just goes to show that metric is outdated. If you can pass basic with asthma, it's outdated.
Brought to you by the same bureaucracy that came up with IPPSA, broke the personnel system, and then told the individual soldier it was their responsibility to fix.
We see it in recruiting now. Someone gets out, wants to come back in after their physical expired. We have to send them through the genesis process and guess what pops up? All the stuff they had before they enlisted we now need to provide documents for... After they honorably completed service with zero disability rating. It's ridiculous.
Should the answer to the discovery that the system is systematically gamed be to bite the bullet and either adopt new standards, or if it is determined the standard is appropriate to be glad we are preventing people from being recruited for whichever disqualifying reason it is?
The solution may involve better pay, better recruitment benefits, *a better deal*. If the army decides that disqualifying conditions are appropriate this indeed makes an impact on recruiting, but improved force strength, and improves the position of servicemembers when it comes to the pay/benefits that they can *and should* demand for their service.
I have my view on that answer - we probably need to adapt new standards.
But right now the problem I see is that the army is sticking its fingers in its ears. It’s pretending that genesis has no impact and no reaction is needed.
So even if my view is wrong, the real problem is the army hasn’t *even tried* any solution.
12 years ago they were the only branch that would take me because I had a "borderline" neck tattoo right on my collar bone. My GT score was 128. Air Force and Marine Corps told me to kick rocks. Army slid a contract my way without hesitation.
It’s because we don’t have an active combat operation requiring mass quantities of human bodies to deploy.
If we have another surge, to like the Middle East or Crimea, I guarantee the ARMY will take every flat foot asthmatic with autism spectrum disorder
Its cause we let good idea fairys in the way. This kid seems like his built like a brick shit house and can run. He seems super healthly.
So what his doctor got too nervous and gave him a prescitipion for Asthama.
Let him in.
We need to stop shooting ourselves in the foot, its not doing us any favors.
In 1980 you could enlist with an active murder warrant, apparently. When I went through Reception at Fort Dix, the security guys at the CI detachment that processed our clearances told us about this individual who enlisted for MI…when they asked him if there was any reason the cops would be looking for him…”yeah, I killed three people in Brooklyn.” (The NYPD was asked to come get him.)
At this point, someone in the DOD is afraid of any preexisting medical conditions and/or it's yet another "we'll save money by not letting people in with medical issues".
We all know that as soon as the balloon goes up GENESIS would either get ignored or every service would make it rain with waivers.
Idk what that one is. I had to breathe into a machine and then use an inhaler to see if it increased my results but my test without the inhaler was good enough
Methacoline challenge test is basically where a doctor has you inhale methacoline then measures your airwaves. The drug can causes your airwaves to narrow so it basically forces you to have an asthma attack if you still have asthma. It's supposed to be pretty accurate in judging if you still have asthma.
If the applicant is driven and what you say is true it’s not the end of the road. They need a current examination and statement written by their physician. Submit the record to meps to get them to appeal the dq. They will deny it. Give all the paperwork to the applicant and have them get in touch with their congressional representative, provide the documentation and request they help get them in the army. I assume he’s also an athlete if he’s scoring that well on his acft. Get statements from his coaches as well. If you get enough paperwork saying this dude can be in the army and he doesn’t get in, it would be a pretty interesting news story.
It’s been done before. But the applicant has to do the leg work you can’t do it for him outside of providing him copies of information that has to do with him.
But, on the flip side, sending dude with a history of asmtha is a risk. Soldiers in BCT have died due to prior history of asmtha.
>But, on the flip side, sending dude with a history of asmtha is a risk. Soldiers in BCT have died due to prior history of asmtha.
That's fair. The only reason we're fighting is because of how unique this situation is. He's already completed things like the gas chamber and the 12-mile ruck. He's completed every physical requirement we want, without an inhaler.
>That's fair. The only reason we're fighting is because of how unique this situation is. He's already completed things like the gas chamber and the 12-mile ruck. He's completed every physical requirement we want, without an inhaler.
How is Genesis DQ'ing someone who's already taken the ACFT, done the gas chamber, rucked etc?
Isn't Genesis way before any of that in the life cycle of a troop?
ROTC Transfer. Originally was going to be an officer, now going enlisted. Or so he thought.
Medically qualified to be an Officer and passed all requirements, but can't be enlisted.
Ya know whats fucked up? I have asthma. Had it before I joined, had it when I joined and still have it now. Always had inhalers, still use them occassionally. Didnt stop me from deploying, maxing the APFT, completing ranger, airborne, sfas etc.
I got in with a waiver in 2007. The entire DoDs policy on asthmatics is fucking moronic.
I was diagnosed with asthma and hay fever when I was a kid. Carried an inhaler since I was about 10 until I was 18. In high school I used to take benadryl almost every day because if I didn't I had crazy allergic reactions to pollen which were exacerbated because of my asthma. Or so I and my whole family believed.
Obviously I lied about this when I joined the army. And the whole time I was in, my hay fever never presented any problems. I figured it was just because I was in a completely different environment with different types of pollen. Somehow the fact that my asthma wasn't an issue never crossed my mind either.
It wasn't until I was already out and at the end of my 20s and back home that I figured out I had never had either asthma or hay fever. I was allergic to cats.
The army didn’t know that I was diagnosed with “exercise induced asthma” at 12/13. A lot of medical professionals don’t know or care that exercise asthma doesn’t cripple or bar people from being fit, and that exercise and pushing limits is the only way to mitigate symptoms without an inhaler.
I’ve only been in 2.5 years, but I’ve done over a dozen ACFTs, gone on many 3-5 mile runs. Never failed the former, and my first 3-mile was the only one where I needed to walk for a couple minutes; it was right after basic and my feet were sort of shot.
Breath control is still my biggest discomfort when running, but my endurance is still a lot better than many others in my unit who don’t have asthma. 🤷♀️
But that’s just my soapbox
The Army first banned Asthma in 1994 (downtime), and only revisited the issue in 2004 (GWOT).
Albuterol became FDA approved in 2001, and the other most common inhaler in 2004.
I say all that to say the Army made those decisions at the height of medical breakthroughs, when little information was available. And they haven’t revisited it with current information.
Honestly I figured it was either at one point he had ADHD meds or Asthma, I knew it wasn't going be something crazy. If like the Army DQed him cause he was a drug king pin or something...you wouldn't be posting it here.
Well you might, but it'd be a different story :)
Just a little messed up that he doesn’t have current asthma. But even if he did, it’s not prohibiting him from exceeding the standard. We gotta update the entrance requirements.
We also need to put the human touch back in for shit like this.
It seems like this kid is amazing recruit and the Army would be lucky to have him.
And here we are, fucking it up over some bullshit.
Then they are going yell at the recruiter for not doing his job.
I was told basic training is the issue. Gas chamber is too far from ambulances to be effective, and they can't have inhalers in Tradoc. But that was a decade ago.
How did he do the gas chamber already which implied he is already in basic training, when he was disqualified by Genesis?
And we keep the one that get asthma during service due to sunk cost so we dont need to get more people that already have asthma pre service. Less cost on their medical care while during service and less payout on VA when they leave service.
He's coming from college ROTC. They do the gas chamber as well. He's done FTXs, passed range, 12 mile ruck, etc. Everything the Army requires you to pass in basic, he's already passed it.
And it would make sense if he had active medical care, but he has no active prescriptions. But I do understand how it is a risk for the Army that they just don't want to take, if he did end up needing medicine (highly unlikely).
It sounds like there's solid grounds there to go through the process to get a waiver.
I'd think that getting a medical exam of the troop from a doc, and noting all the above about them passing the gas chamber, passing a ruck, scoring high on the ACFT etc. ON TOP of passing a medical exam of his lungs by a pulmonologist would be solid criteria for a waiver.
For decades, the system worked on having very strict rules that were very poorly enforced. . .if the recruit didn't volunteer the information or it didn't show up at a MEPS physical, it didn't exist. Now thanks to Genesis, we have strict rules strictly enforced, and a decades-old unspoken rule about shutting your mouth during the recruiting process is blown up.
>ON TOP of passing a medical exam of his lungs by a pulmonologist would be solid criteria for a waiver.
This was our hiccup. He passed the regular PFT with the results you'd expect from an athlete.
But he failed the methacholine challenge. Pulmonologist did note that he had no symptoms (no wheezing, no shortness of breath, talking normal) and did not require medicine relief after the test. Pulmonologist stated he didn't need medical therapy, recommended no medicine. Said he was good to go. As far as I know, methacholine should fuck someone up if they have asthma, not have them sitting there having a conversation.
It sounds more like allergies than asthma, or he wasn't blowing hard enough, so we're still seeing what we can do.
I think those details should've been considered. Failed on paper, but physically fine.
ROTC will sometimes do gas chambers and weird shit for some reason.
I know guard units will sometimes let people bring potential recruits when they do stuff like that too. My buddy got tased and OC sprayed like that.
If the Army actually looked into my conditions when I joined, I’d have been a DQ. I was one of the few that was just honest because I didn’t want it hanging over my head, but they never even checked!
My recruiter didn't tell me to lie, but he suggested some possible outcomes of telling the truth vs being less than honest with the Army that I should consider before answering any questions.
That's why I didn't join the marines, I was honest with them and they said no and I said can we pretend I didn't just say all that? Then I got a huge fucking lecture about how I clearly lacked the integrity to be a Marine, can you believe that shit you go to a job interview and they say no also allow us to elaborate on what a piece of shit you are. I went across the hall to the army and hadn't learned my lesson and started telling them everything, recruiter stopped me and said "do you wanna join the Army?" I said yeah, he said "stop telling me shit"
Funniest thing is that I was prescribed adderall while I was in the army and they were fine with it. Absolutely absurd that it would DQ anyone getting in.
Which is fucking stupid. I was on it all through high school. But because I joined during the surge it wasn’t a big deal.
I had to scrape by through willpower and hate in undergrad for ROTC. But once I hit active no one cared anymore and I screamed through a masters and doctorate with top grades.
There was a guy in the server who spent, literally, every free penny he had trying to track down documents from his doctor for an incident several years ago. Repeatedly. Because he would give them what they asked for and then MEPS would say, "No, we need this other thing." People who come from very little money and need every hour at their job (which is a decent chunk of the recruiting pool) DO NOT HAVE THE TIME AND MONEY to continue traveling 3-5 hours ONE WAY to get notes from a doctor they saw once when they were 11.
If they're willing to waive some of the shit they need to figure out a faster, better process, because people are not and should not be willing to go into the red attempting to chase down one piece of paper *multiple times*.
Same lol. Now that I’m in it’s a convenient way to access my army medical records and view labs, etc. But damn if they used it to pull records when I was trying to join would have gotten me fucked. And all for silly stuff like being on certain prescriptions for a few months or dental surgery for a root canal etc lol….
I had like hives on my skin all over my body when I ate eggs one day. I’m not sure if my body was trippen but I went to the emergency room and it went away while I waited like 4 hours to be seen. When the MEPS doctor saw it on his computer, he just wanted some details and then after that told me that I won’t need a waiver since it happened 15 years ago and didn’t need meds or had a reoccurrence
Oh man here's a good one that actually argued in defense of Genesis (not that I like it). I went to basic with a mentally handicapped guy, should have never been allowed in. When I say handicapped we literally had to help him dress in the morning, get his name tapes on the right side, tie his boots etc. that was in reception. We go off to basic and naturally he's always fucked up and it was the week before the range and we're all like bro they're actually gonna give this guy live ammo. Well one day his platoon was being smoked and he just stands up and the drills are like "ay what the fuck are you doing get the fuck down!" And he says "No I quit!" And they said "what do you mean you quit you can't just quit what the fuck are you gonna do after dropping out of the Army!" He replies "I'll work at McDonald's!" They say "wtf do you mean you'll work at McDonald's how're you gonna support a family" to which he replies "I don't want a family!" And subsequently he got let go before they ever gave him live ammo, I can believe a shit bag recruiter letting him slide but the fact he made it through MEPS is incredible I mean you only needed to talk to him for about 30 seconds to see he wasn't very bright. Always wonder what happened to him.
Yeah I remember his last name, I'll have to look at my yearbook to see his first name, I know I've looked him up before and I've never found a social media but I'm not sure he could set one up anyhow
I tried to join back in 2022, and had 2 different recruiters tell me not to bother/it’s not gonna happen with childhood leukemia on my record (I was 16). Took talking to a War College Fellow on our campus, who talked to a buddy somewhere, who asked a recruiter in my area to put together my OCS packet. We worked for ~7-8 months getting med docs and waiver approvals and doctors recommendations before I could even submit the packet.
All that and they are still telling kids whose mothers got them an adderall prescription in middle school to get fucked. Bullshit
It took my a year and a half to enter. Started in 99 and entered in April of 01. In my youth I got in with the wrong crowd and had plenty of misdemeanors. Went to join army and marines said no due to my record.
Went back to court with the same judge had everything set aside/expunged. Army recruiting said no due to previous knowledge but let it go up the chain for approval. Eventually again said no.
My father 22 years in the army 17 of them in oda asked his friends to write a letter on my behalf. E9s, 06s and higher, W5s as a testimony of my character an everyone was in awe. So of them were in the ranger hall of fame, Richard Carmona (surgeon general) and many more. Again came back as no.
Went to my congressman and launched a inquiry and finally I got a maybe. I had to pass an interview with a major and if he signed off then I'm in.
Walked into his office told him about my past and how I am now. But it lasted about 15 minutes and he said yes.
Recruiter was surprised but did my paperwork and boom was at 30th ag for basic.
Once completed and checking into bragg I did feel very embarrassed due to my folder I was carrying around. Everyone's was this with initial paperwork but mine was thick and very noticeable. E-5 looking at my paperwork was like how did you even get In? I told her persistence. Then she removed all paperwork and shredded everything that was not needed and was basically a fresh start.
I did 10 years both active and guard. 2 combat deployments OEF1/OIF1. Then transfered to the guard since no bonuses were being given out during my window of reenlistment.
I appreciate it. It was a Very long experience but I preach to the current generation on how you and your friends can mess up your goals. But the army gave me everything to make me successful in the civilian world. Have me the confidence to ask or the local prom queen when in leave. She became my wife and now hand 6 beautiful kids 5 girls 1 boy. And now 16 years later still together and opening up my own telecom business.
I would be curious to see the math from recruits who failed out of basic, AIT or med board within the 1st year in the military both before and after the start of genesis.
Were there more Soldiers failing out medically in basic, AIT, 1st year of service before genesis? Because one could argue genesis is doing its job screening medical issues if the numbers have dropped.
If they've gone up or relatively stayed the same, then its just another hurdle to join the service. *See the meme of guy put pole in his own bike tire while riding it.*
I saw a guy saying there was a higher number of people joining to purposely get medically retired, not sure how big of an issue that was.
Seems like something they could easily look into even before Genesis. They signed over the rights for them to get those records.
It makes it significantly harder for recruits to hide disqualifying conditions. The minor stuff that everyone used to lie about now appears in the system, forcing people to get waivers. Not everyone is willing to deal with the waiver process, and of course some get denied.
My thing is, I didn’t even lie about my conditions before Genesis. Still got in because they didn’t fully check records. I would’ve been a DQ with Genesis.
That’s my main issue with it.
Genesis reveals your entire *recorded* medical history to Army doctors.
There are a lot of disqualifying conditions and, more importantly, conditions that require evals and waivers. This takes a lot of time and energy to process. Waivers are not quick. Applicants lose interest.
In the before before times, some of us joined by being less than honest with recruiters. That is no longer possible.
So this software accesses health record databases, populating someone’s past medical history?
Seems like that approach would bias for applicants without previous healthcare access, not necessarily just healthy candidates.
It doesn't. Contrary to what people think, there's a ton of information it does not find. If I recall correctly there's a group of participating insurance companies. If you got care outside of that ring, you're a ghost.
Just because things are in a computer doesn't mean magic happens.
The system itself isn’t “bad,” but it disqualifies people for things that only affect them on paper.
Lot of past conditions are getting people DQd, requiring waivers which often get denied.
The reason people used to just lie before is because the conditions weren’t actually affecting them. Can’t do that anymore.
Me, point in case. I got diagnosed with asthma as a kid. I was a varsity distance runner in high school with no problems. Recruiter said not to use the “A” word at MEPs. I didn’t bring it up and never had problems in the Army.
Now, somebody with a history of schizophrenia who has been prescribed meds for it, they’re gonna get flagged and they should. It almost always comes out in BCT and it wastes everybody’s time. This system would be a total win if this was the only people who it caught.
The waiver process is well intentioned. “Hey potativated, you said you had trouble breathing as a kid. We want to make sure you’re fine now and you’re not going to keel over from an asthma attack at mile 2 of your first ruck March in BCT. Go see your doctor, get him to do a breathing test, record the results, and send them to us.”
Here’s how the system actually goes. “Hey potativated, we’re going to need your doctor to perform a test to measure your breathing. Oh, you have the test finally. Oh, see, this is the wrong one. Here’s the one you’re supposed to do. Oh, you did it, well, that’s not the right form. We’re going to need your doctor to fill it out on this form. Oh, you’ve got it on the right form? Well we’re actually going to need it from a specialist. Oh, you’ve got the right form from the right specialist? Great. We’ll review this and let you know the outcome.”
Every “Oh” in this requires another visit to your doctor. Getting anything scheduled with a doctor these days is already months. And doctors visits aren’t cheap. Their reviews can take months as well.
Also, what happens if people actually want to go through the waiver process? To meet numbers, the Army *needs* Soldiers who need waivers under Genesis. Are they going to plus up the people who process these waivers? Or are they going let them get completely backlogged worse than security clearance reviewers were in 2017?
In my day you could just lie and if you weren't a TriCare kid/didn't have something obviously wrong with you they'd just let you through. Which is what the recruiters depended on.
Now they can't do this anymore.
It’s an electronic medical records system. It’s Cerner rebranded. Most medical records are digitized / electronic so these systems are able to aggregate them so you can see a persons complete medical history. It doesn’t rely on a person bringing hard copies to a new medical provider or system or having them faxed over. For the most part you can no longer hide parts of your medical record-it’s all available. EPIC, Cerner they can all access each other and other systems
As others have said, Genesis reveals a lot of records that were generally ignored or lied about before.
Of course Genesis isnt the real ‘bad guy’ behind the problems, and puts the real issues into light - the general health in the US, which you could argue where that comes from. It’s just easier to point to a single thing like Genesis and say that it’s the problem instead of digging deeper.
I mean, pretty good ACFT score and ASVAB score but uh....what did Genesis disqualify for? There are many waiverable conditions unless you were like that one guy that had scoliosis, and a bevy of mental issues trying to go to OCS.
https://www.reddit.com/r/army/comments/18ekwpg/genesis_is_100_the_reason_for_the_recruiting/kco8fwy/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3
Answered in another comment. Nothing quite as bad as that guy, but still one of the big no-no’s in Army’s eye.
As I told the other person, he’s also already done the gas chamber with no issue. Asthma has been a dirty word to the army for a long time, but how bad is it really in this case?
That as well. I think they’re too black and white. If we updated the body comp program to factor in physical fitness, why not do the same for medical conditions?
Someone who’s performing past the level you want them to perform at deserved a closer look.
They actually update these frequently (every 2-3 years) , but if they’re in the reg, there is usually a medical reason for it.
But I do think the waiver process could be much faster.
I can't say this enough. It's confounded by medical personnel who will will always side with caution in interpreting those standards. Genesis is just a system that searches for data points. How those data points are interpretated and enforced results in the problems. The bureaucracy of needing and attaining or denying waivers is the most broken thing I've seen with no fix in sight. Add that even when a waiver is given, if it takes more than 45 days the applicant more often walks because a lot changes in their lives in 1.5 months. This was one sticking point I had with the Army G1, especially since the Army's competition in low skill service industries will hire you in minutes to days of applying. They felt "dedicated applicants" should be willing to stay the course. Pretty big disconnect.
Honestly, I’m a big fan of the “fat camps.” I had to lose weight to join, but I was in way better shape walking into the recruiting station than a lot of the skinny kids who showed up to OSUT. I think we lose out on a lot of solid applicants because they’re overweight but don’t have the resources/environment to get that situated.
That’s a good point too. It took trying to lose only 20lbs for me to become sympathetic to overweight people.
That shit was hard, without guidance. And expensive to eat healthy.
Army (the DOD as a whole really) tends to overcorrect.
And yeah, some recruits have died in training due to things they lied about (or were told to lie about) and things that were diagnosed.
But at the same time we all know the DOD will just lower standards when push comes to shove.
Even if a draft were somehow passed next year, the DOD couldn't take 2/3rds of the 17-21 year olds due to education, obesity or health.
So the nonsense as shown on this thread shows how stupid the DOD has become.
Okay, some kid was treated for a condition years ago - but they are not taking meds for it now. Kid had a broken bone - fine, 18X is out of the question but 42A or 92Y shouldn't be.
As always, common sense just seems to elude the DOD.
My son runs a 6 minute mile, 5'10 about 190 lbs, redneck working man build.....
Has wanted to join his entire life but can't because he has crohns. Which can be managed with his own shot every 8 weeks or so, meanwhile certain job fields are legit filled with people on the spectrum. makes sense
The reality is that the DoD realized there was an X amount of people lying and getting into the services just to get medically discharged. These people are provided (rightfully) VA services. This is the number crunchers seeing a red value and trying to reduce it. The DoD has many ways it could solve this:
One is by streamlining the waiver process and/or automatically waiving stuff in Genesis. Instead of half fixing the system, fix it all the way. Someone diagnosed but not treated for X years? Immediate referral at MEPS. Still treated? Have a path to contact their Primary Care to see if they can get a waiver. We put a BK in Afghanistan and Iraq logistically we should be able to solve this issue in house.
Two, realize that the pool of Americans is, in fact, smaller than what it actually is for military service and start to care about QOL issues for the juniors they’re attempting to enlist and commission. Maybe PVT Joe will come into the service if they’re guaranteed to not be serve crap and live in squalor supervised by a 21 year old that runs fast? Maybe LT Jane will stay in past their ADSO if they aren’t raked over the coals by their superiors?
Three, we continue to harass the recruiters and put hands to ears and eyes to blame them instead of attempting to fix other systemic issues plaguing our services?
Genesis is the symptom, the actual problem is the absolutely ridiculous standards for getting in. A middle school precautionary prescription should not disqualify someone. Issues that are fine while in the service but not before is ridiculous.
Removing genesis will only put a bandaid on this issue. Fixing MEPS medical process is the actual fix we need. Boomers checking our buttholes aren't helping either
Spot on. We should not be DQing people for conditions that we allow after enlisting.
If the big concern is money, we’re already used to telling vets not service connected, so flag them and make sure the condition isn’t service connected.
The perspective I was presented with was that Genesis is meant to avert disability payout to those who should’ve never enlisted in the first place due to having something in their medical history that could potentially qualify them for disability after enlisting (versus having a disability stemming solely from something service-related). It’s like the MCU’s Project Insight, but in a medical sense.
Imagine that kid walking in your door and you thinking shit, easiest and most qualified person I’ve ever seen.
Then boom, DQd for a very borderline condition.
Did you shave today?
https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2019/09/05/army-launches-inquiry-into-how-teen-with-autism-and-arm-disorders-was-recruited/
Lol I remember when I joined in 2020 right before genesis became a thing, we were sitting in this room filling out medical history and under surgeries i started writing down my wisdom teeth extraction from like ten years earlier. Then the lady said if you write something down you have to put down the doctors info and all this other shit lol… I was like hell noooo and crossed that shit out lol. She didn’t even question it.
There's multiple things that come into play when you're selecting somebody to enlist or commission in the Army.
Medical history is an important part of that.
We all make jokes about people with Autism joining MI, but there are people that have medical conditions that aren't "high functioning" or are just incompatible with military service.
So if somebody lies about their medical history and joins, maybe they make it through an enlistment, maybe they don't.
Maybe they "Develop" their condition they joined with while they are enlisted, and now the Army can be on the hook for it down the road through medical retirement or medical discharge, etc.
There's also federal law at play here, the government decided that certain medical conditions prohibit you from military service.
Now Genesis has the ability to pull from all these medical databases whereas they mostly relied on applicants to be honest and provide them with their records if they had something that was potentially disqualifying.
Add to that how many recruiters were like "Don't ever bring this up" under the old system, because there wasn't a means to detect those records back then.
Now they can see everything that's been documented and uploaded to the national healthcare computer systems, and it's limiting a lot of people that might have joined otherwise.
Genesis isn't the only reason, hell, I don't even think it's the main reason.
One of the biggest reasons we are in a recruiting crisis is the internet.
Just spend a day going through the /r/army reddit. All day, all week, all year you can just find story after story of people getting fucked down by their commands, people not getting paid right, people in charge ignoring rules and all the other fucking horrible stuff we see in this sub every day.
*Rarely* do we see anything positive, like the guy that got to go shoot gunnery last week. Occasionally you see some positive stuff from the mods, or people that are editors at Army times and whatnot.
But the average joe user? It's fucking *rare* that you see an Army praise post.
Potential Soldiers see this shit. They see the social media posts from their friends. They see all this stuff and rarely do they see any positives.
The Army is tackling some quality of life stuff, but they are doing a terrible fucking job showing that to the populace.
Might be a weird question but is there anyway for me to check what Genesis would pull up for me? I wanna join after I finish my degree but don’t know if it’s a waste of time since I had Asthma when I was like 8 and was on Prozac from 4-6 💀
If you haven’t had any clinical encounters for asthma after age 13 you’re good.
As far as checking what it sees, just assume it can see all of your medical history.
Also if you’re getting a degree, consider going Officer. And Air Force…
In 2005 I tried to enlist in the army, crushed my asvab. Unfortunately i did a lot of drugs in the 90s and came clean about it during interviews and drew a evaluation by a psychiatrist who said I wouldn’t be able handle the military and was DQ’d. still pisseed about it, if I could have done it over I would not mention a peep about past drug use, let alone volunteer it.
I EPTS a handful of kids every cycle because their asthma starts becoming an issue.
I've been a recruiter and a Drill Sergeant. I had the same frustrations as you. I'm sure genesis is a HUGE problem for a lot of recruiters. PT stud in one of our platoon went down during the 2 mile and we had to get him E911 out. Just because it wasn't an issue that one time he took the ACFT doesnt mean it won't show up.
Unprecedented, changing times require unprecedentedly low standards. My friend joined at 34, and basically fulfilled a lifelong dream. He said that the kids they're recruiting now are bottom of the barrel. The reception barracks sounded like prison.
Had Asthma as a kid, like most pre-genesis recruits, was told not to mention it when I got to MEPS. almost 23 years later almost exclusively in FORCSCOM with seven deployments not a single issue. Does sma\_pao or whatever the account is still monitor these kinds of posts???
Not necessarily Genesis per se, but the fact that the list of disqualifying conditions set forth by DOD is longer than Tolstoy's *War and Peace*. Genesis just makes it easier to catch 'em. It seems DOD wants all applicants to have had a perfect clean bill of health for their entire life with nary a scratch at the time of enlisting.
I went to MEPS and a consult as vision was my only issue. They fucked up with my astigmatism and I noticed the doc also put in the wrong diagnosis code that corresponds to a retinal detachment. I fucking swear I never ever had that, nor does it match with my most recent records and I’m meeting a civilian eye expert. I’m sort of on a similar boat as you are. Good luck OP.
Failed the methacholine challenge by 1%. It was more than likely his allergies and not asthma, considering the lack of asthmatic symptoms following.
Pulmonologist’s notes were ignored on that matter though.
Yeah, if Genesis was around when I enlisted I would’ve needed a couple of waivers. I’m allergic to bees and actually had a reaction I went to the hospital for three weeks before I went to MEPs. I got stung by a bee in the field once and my doc just gave me a handful of Benadryl after I begged him not to tell our PSG. But besides that I never had an issue with it.
that’s just an objectively false statement. genesis might be to blame for recruits not making it past meps but that doesn’t account for how many people consider joining, then hear stories about the conditions soldiers endure and decide to not even step foot into a recruiting office
Without knowing what the disqualifying condition is its hard to give a real opinion on this. Theres quite a lot of things that wouod be completely reasonable. You could do both of those things and be bordering on renal failure, or have an arterial stenosis that could become a heart attack at any moment. They could be have been diagnosed schizophrenic. Diabetes, autoimmune disorders, cancer. All of things are diseases you could have while still being smart, strong and fast at one snapshot moment in time.
I agree with you that Gensis is a problem, well more accurately the DODs perceptions of what conditions are unfit for service are a problem that was masked by incomplete records but one of those is easier to solve than the other. But the bottom line is that just having a high ASVAB and high ACFT does not mean you're medically fit for service.
I put a dude in that had history of Asthma. All we had to was take a pulmonary functions test, get medical records and pharmacy records and the doctor approved his waiver.
I’m convinced this is tied to the VA. They already don’t want to acknowledge or pay you for anything when you get out. Everything is preexisting and the military didn’t do anything to you.
Take me for example I joined at 17 with no medical issues. Sincerely I didn’t have anything when I joined. Once I got out they blamed everything on preexisting before I joined the service. What they couldn’t blame on that, they blame on pregnancy!
Now they’re trying to catch it on the front end. Identify all of the preexisting conditions and you won’t have to pay them when they get out.
They’re shooting themselves in the foot because they can still be paid if the service makes the condition worse, which we all know it will. In the meantime, we will continue to make it damn near impossible for people to join.
Right now it takes more than 3 weeks for someone to join due to this system. Putting more recruiters on the street isn’t going to help. One of the only insurance carriers Genesis doesn’t talk to is Medicaid, because of course we want the poors to still join!
Asthma gets a lot, if that’s not it maybe he was prescribed adderall!
That’s correct actually, it was asthma. But the last prescribed inhaler was 5 years ago. The issue with that is, there were none prescribed after the cut off age except for that one, and no refills just a one-time thing. He says his doctor prescribed it as a precaution, and based on the pharmacy records and his physical aptitude, that seems true. Which is messed up. Even if it was for active symptoms, 5 years without medicine should logically say they’re good right? And we allow people to stay in after they get asthma during service, so what’re we doing really. If he can score 550 on the ACFT, there should be more nuance applied.
I find it a bit strange how much more difficult it is to join the Army now, in a recruiting crisis. When the Army at one point was the easiest branch to join as long as you had all your limbs, and didn't have an active murder warrant.
They’ve refused to believe genesis is an issue because it’s just “enforcing the standard”, and anyhting less would admit we’ve been faking it for 30 years. Take a whole brigade, see if genesis finds anything we didn’t know before. Give em all amnesty. They don’t want to admit it we gamed rhe system for years.
Faking it for 30 years? People have been lying about the requirements since requirements were invented! I say, return to those Second World War standards. If they were good enough to clobber the Nazis they're good enough for today.
How can we make this man SECARMY?
Audie Murphy was denied enlistment multiple times back in the day..
I mean he also was underage when he tried enlisting and had to have his older sister sign an affidavit saying he was old enough.
Flat feet automatically disqualifying even if you can walk fine on them?
IT WAS THE GOOD OLD DAYS
I'm fucked then. Honorably right?
if I'm not mistaken, post Pearl Harbor only VD DQ'd you..
PROMOTE THIS MAN!
Yeah WW2 standards is where it’s at. Even before genesis I saw dudes in boot camp getting a boot camp medical discharge because they found out they have some random medical condition that’s honestly irrelevant. Like they would make it halfway through marine boot camp and then oh you have some weird liver thing no one has ever heard of even though you’re a PT stud and have a good head on your shoulders. Yeah sorry no can do.
Shouldn’t Genesis be finding all those things on current service members anyway?
Part of the problem is some conditions you can serve with but not join with. My wife developed asthma while in the service. It made her non deployable but after some treatment she may have even been able to deploy on some conditions. But she was able to keep serving, she just chose to move on from the military.
There was a thread earlier this month about how health conditions of current service members can/will DQ you for OCS/Warrant/Green to Gold. You can be broken as an NCO. but not as an Officer Candidate? Seems to be cursory, callow, and subjective
That’s not really new though.
It caught me when I tried to go for flight medic and had the flight physical. I stopped taking my prescribed adhd medication in order to pass. The TMC NCOIC was like “are you SURE you’re not taking anything???” I knew I’d been had at that point and fessed up. It’s always a first time no go, but “where there’s a will, there’s a waiver”.
I just think we should compare it to what we knew about them on entry 👀
But what I am asking is shouldn’t these issues be popping up for service members during PHAs and whatnot?
Y'all are being honest during your PHAs?
It's been gamed to the point that I met a recruiter with active asthma. Moderate asthma can be managed with allergy medicine which is how she got through basic. She's retired now. But this just goes to show that metric is outdated. If you can pass basic with asthma, it's outdated.
Brought to you by the same bureaucracy that came up with IPPSA, broke the personnel system, and then told the individual soldier it was their responsibility to fix.
> we gamed the system for years. 💯
We see it in recruiting now. Someone gets out, wants to come back in after their physical expired. We have to send them through the genesis process and guess what pops up? All the stuff they had before they enlisted we now need to provide documents for... After they honorably completed service with zero disability rating. It's ridiculous.
Should the answer to the discovery that the system is systematically gamed be to bite the bullet and either adopt new standards, or if it is determined the standard is appropriate to be glad we are preventing people from being recruited for whichever disqualifying reason it is? The solution may involve better pay, better recruitment benefits, *a better deal*. If the army decides that disqualifying conditions are appropriate this indeed makes an impact on recruiting, but improved force strength, and improves the position of servicemembers when it comes to the pay/benefits that they can *and should* demand for their service.
I have my view on that answer - we probably need to adapt new standards. But right now the problem I see is that the army is sticking its fingers in its ears. It’s pretending that genesis has no impact and no reaction is needed. So even if my view is wrong, the real problem is the army hasn’t *even tried* any solution.
12 years ago they were the only branch that would take me because I had a "borderline" neck tattoo right on my collar bone. My GT score was 128. Air Force and Marine Corps told me to kick rocks. Army slid a contract my way without hesitation.
It was a time. Took just about anyone and threw money bags at us.
It’s because we don’t have an active combat operation requiring mass quantities of human bodies to deploy. If we have another surge, to like the Middle East or Crimea, I guarantee the ARMY will take every flat foot asthmatic with autism spectrum disorder
Its cause we let good idea fairys in the way. This kid seems like his built like a brick shit house and can run. He seems super healthly. So what his doctor got too nervous and gave him a prescitipion for Asthama. Let him in. We need to stop shooting ourselves in the foot, its not doing us any favors.
Hey hey hey now I had to make my x too
We're no longer in "active" conflicts, it was far easier to join when Iraq was heating up and Afghanistan kicked off. Now it is a different story
In 1980 you could enlist with an active murder warrant, apparently. When I went through Reception at Fort Dix, the security guys at the CI detachment that processed our clearances told us about this individual who enlisted for MI…when they asked him if there was any reason the cops would be looking for him…”yeah, I killed three people in Brooklyn.” (The NYPD was asked to come get him.)
We still had a lot of applicants get in there and word vomit/overshare dubiously relevant medical history.
At this point, someone in the DOD is afraid of any preexisting medical conditions and/or it's yet another "we'll save money by not letting people in with medical issues". We all know that as soon as the balloon goes up GENESIS would either get ignored or every service would make it rain with waivers.
Yeah, even Steve Rogers was eventually able to join
I had to get a pulmonary function test to join because MEPS was full of illiterate people
Did they make you do the methacholine challenge or the regular test?
Idk what that one is. I had to breathe into a machine and then use an inhaler to see if it increased my results but my test without the inhaler was good enough
Methacoline challenge test is basically where a doctor has you inhale methacoline then measures your airwaves. The drug can causes your airwaves to narrow so it basically forces you to have an asthma attack if you still have asthma. It's supposed to be pretty accurate in judging if you still have asthma.
Induce an asthma attack lol. If you can walk out of MEPS you pass. If you are wheeled out under a plastic sheet, you FAILED.
Thanks for making me laugh hella hard
If the applicant is driven and what you say is true it’s not the end of the road. They need a current examination and statement written by their physician. Submit the record to meps to get them to appeal the dq. They will deny it. Give all the paperwork to the applicant and have them get in touch with their congressional representative, provide the documentation and request they help get them in the army. I assume he’s also an athlete if he’s scoring that well on his acft. Get statements from his coaches as well. If you get enough paperwork saying this dude can be in the army and he doesn’t get in, it would be a pretty interesting news story. It’s been done before. But the applicant has to do the leg work you can’t do it for him outside of providing him copies of information that has to do with him. But, on the flip side, sending dude with a history of asmtha is a risk. Soldiers in BCT have died due to prior history of asmtha.
>But, on the flip side, sending dude with a history of asmtha is a risk. Soldiers in BCT have died due to prior history of asmtha. That's fair. The only reason we're fighting is because of how unique this situation is. He's already completed things like the gas chamber and the 12-mile ruck. He's completed every physical requirement we want, without an inhaler.
>That's fair. The only reason we're fighting is because of how unique this situation is. He's already completed things like the gas chamber and the 12-mile ruck. He's completed every physical requirement we want, without an inhaler. How is Genesis DQ'ing someone who's already taken the ACFT, done the gas chamber, rucked etc? Isn't Genesis way before any of that in the life cycle of a troop?
ROTC Transfer. Originally was going to be an officer, now going enlisted. Or so he thought. Medically qualified to be an Officer and passed all requirements, but can't be enlisted.
lmao typical.
Get that boy a waiver!!!
It really shouldn't be that hard of a process to get an applicant a waiver though. The DODI and waivers process needs to be reworked.
If the applicant legit doesn’t have asthma hit me up, I can get them in.
Ya know whats fucked up? I have asthma. Had it before I joined, had it when I joined and still have it now. Always had inhalers, still use them occassionally. Didnt stop me from deploying, maxing the APFT, completing ranger, airborne, sfas etc. I got in with a waiver in 2007. The entire DoDs policy on asthmatics is fucking moronic.
Agreed. DoD has seen asthma as a dirty word for so long, when it's easily managed. And often times, not an issue at all like in this guy's case.
I was diagnosed with asthma and hay fever when I was a kid. Carried an inhaler since I was about 10 until I was 18. In high school I used to take benadryl almost every day because if I didn't I had crazy allergic reactions to pollen which were exacerbated because of my asthma. Or so I and my whole family believed. Obviously I lied about this when I joined the army. And the whole time I was in, my hay fever never presented any problems. I figured it was just because I was in a completely different environment with different types of pollen. Somehow the fact that my asthma wasn't an issue never crossed my mind either. It wasn't until I was already out and at the end of my 20s and back home that I figured out I had never had either asthma or hay fever. I was allergic to cats.
Did the doctor at MEPS not realize this was the case after looking at his asshole?
Meanwhile you have tons of prior service guys being disqualified for medical bullshit like that yet the VA keeps fucking them on disability.
Agreed. If the Army/DoD wants to take this approach then eventually no one is going to be able to join the military.
There can be more nuance applied - by the waiver authority. MEPS is just rote regulation. The service then gets to own "the risk" of such a recruit.
The army didn’t know that I was diagnosed with “exercise induced asthma” at 12/13. A lot of medical professionals don’t know or care that exercise asthma doesn’t cripple or bar people from being fit, and that exercise and pushing limits is the only way to mitigate symptoms without an inhaler. I’ve only been in 2.5 years, but I’ve done over a dozen ACFTs, gone on many 3-5 mile runs. Never failed the former, and my first 3-mile was the only one where I needed to walk for a couple minutes; it was right after basic and my feet were sort of shot. Breath control is still my biggest discomfort when running, but my endurance is still a lot better than many others in my unit who don’t have asthma. 🤷♀️ But that’s just my soapbox
The Army first banned Asthma in 1994 (downtime), and only revisited the issue in 2004 (GWOT). Albuterol became FDA approved in 2001, and the other most common inhaler in 2004. I say all that to say the Army made those decisions at the height of medical breakthroughs, when little information was available. And they haven’t revisited it with current information.
Honestly I figured it was either at one point he had ADHD meds or Asthma, I knew it wasn't going be something crazy. If like the Army DQed him cause he was a drug king pin or something...you wouldn't be posting it here. Well you might, but it'd be a different story :)
Just a little messed up that he doesn’t have current asthma. But even if he did, it’s not prohibiting him from exceeding the standard. We gotta update the entrance requirements.
We also need to put the human touch back in for shit like this. It seems like this kid is amazing recruit and the Army would be lucky to have him. And here we are, fucking it up over some bullshit. Then they are going yell at the recruiter for not doing his job.
I was told basic training is the issue. Gas chamber is too far from ambulances to be effective, and they can't have inhalers in Tradoc. But that was a decade ago.
What if I told you he also already did the gas chamber?
How did he do the gas chamber already which implied he is already in basic training, when he was disqualified by Genesis? And we keep the one that get asthma during service due to sunk cost so we dont need to get more people that already have asthma pre service. Less cost on their medical care while during service and less payout on VA when they leave service.
He's coming from college ROTC. They do the gas chamber as well. He's done FTXs, passed range, 12 mile ruck, etc. Everything the Army requires you to pass in basic, he's already passed it. And it would make sense if he had active medical care, but he has no active prescriptions. But I do understand how it is a risk for the Army that they just don't want to take, if he did end up needing medicine (highly unlikely).
It sounds like there's solid grounds there to go through the process to get a waiver. I'd think that getting a medical exam of the troop from a doc, and noting all the above about them passing the gas chamber, passing a ruck, scoring high on the ACFT etc. ON TOP of passing a medical exam of his lungs by a pulmonologist would be solid criteria for a waiver. For decades, the system worked on having very strict rules that were very poorly enforced. . .if the recruit didn't volunteer the information or it didn't show up at a MEPS physical, it didn't exist. Now thanks to Genesis, we have strict rules strictly enforced, and a decades-old unspoken rule about shutting your mouth during the recruiting process is blown up.
>ON TOP of passing a medical exam of his lungs by a pulmonologist would be solid criteria for a waiver. This was our hiccup. He passed the regular PFT with the results you'd expect from an athlete. But he failed the methacholine challenge. Pulmonologist did note that he had no symptoms (no wheezing, no shortness of breath, talking normal) and did not require medicine relief after the test. Pulmonologist stated he didn't need medical therapy, recommended no medicine. Said he was good to go. As far as I know, methacholine should fuck someone up if they have asthma, not have them sitting there having a conversation. It sounds more like allergies than asthma, or he wasn't blowing hard enough, so we're still seeing what we can do. I think those details should've been considered. Failed on paper, but physically fine.
ROTC will sometimes do gas chambers and weird shit for some reason. I know guard units will sometimes let people bring potential recruits when they do stuff like that too. My buddy got tased and OC sprayed like that.
Which is insane, because I've been prescribed both since I've been in. Lol.
I can be smart and strong, but the moment the Army figures out how bad I got the tism’, I’m fucked.
If the Army actually checked for autism they may as well just delete CMF 35 from all systems, and half of 25 as well.
Only place that weaponizes autism more effectively than the 35 series is 4chan
And much of AMEDD
add 17 series to that list as well
The whole damn branch too no less. That and every 255 warrant.
If the Army actually looked into my conditions when I joined, I’d have been a DQ. I was one of the few that was just honest because I didn’t want it hanging over my head, but they never even checked!
My recruiter didn't tell me to lie, but he suggested some possible outcomes of telling the truth vs being less than honest with the Army that I should consider before answering any questions.
Never seen a group of people have to fight so hard to serve their country during a recruiting crisis
Different generation. I submitted my retirement packet a couple months ago! But I went through the same thing in this respect.
That's why I didn't join the marines, I was honest with them and they said no and I said can we pretend I didn't just say all that? Then I got a huge fucking lecture about how I clearly lacked the integrity to be a Marine, can you believe that shit you go to a job interview and they say no also allow us to elaborate on what a piece of shit you are. I went across the hall to the army and hadn't learned my lesson and started telling them everything, recruiter stopped me and said "do you wanna join the Army?" I said yeah, he said "stop telling me shit"
Adderall and any/all similar prescriptions prescribed in Middle School or High School are the biggest discriminators I’m tracking at the moment
Funniest thing is that I was prescribed adderall while I was in the army and they were fine with it. Absolutely absurd that it would DQ anyone getting in.
Im a reserve major on Vyvanse and they don’t care. I’m so much better of an officer now that I’m treating the symptoms I’ve had my entire life.
Which is fucking stupid. I was on it all through high school. But because I joined during the surge it wasn’t a big deal. I had to scrape by through willpower and hate in undergrad for ROTC. But once I hit active no one cared anymore and I screamed through a masters and doctorate with top grades.
[удалено]
Almost anything is waiverable if you have the patience, documentation, and the army needs you.
There was a guy in the server who spent, literally, every free penny he had trying to track down documents from his doctor for an incident several years ago. Repeatedly. Because he would give them what they asked for and then MEPS would say, "No, we need this other thing." People who come from very little money and need every hour at their job (which is a decent chunk of the recruiting pool) DO NOT HAVE THE TIME AND MONEY to continue traveling 3-5 hours ONE WAY to get notes from a doctor they saw once when they were 11. If they're willing to waive some of the shit they need to figure out a faster, better process, because people are not and should not be willing to go into the red attempting to chase down one piece of paper *multiple times*.
He broke a finger playing high school football?
Damn I would have been DQd then 🤣
Went to MEPS to reenlist again, joined in 2020 without a hiccup & wanting to join again this year. Genesis found an emergency visit from 2008 💀💀💀
Genesis would’ve bent me over and had its way with me if it was a thing when I joined.
Same lol. Now that I’m in it’s a convenient way to access my army medical records and view labs, etc. But damn if they used it to pull records when I was trying to join would have gotten me fucked. And all for silly stuff like being on certain prescriptions for a few months or dental surgery for a root canal etc lol….
That’s so silly lmaooo. Did you get in at least or were you fucked?
I had like hives on my skin all over my body when I ate eggs one day. I’m not sure if my body was trippen but I went to the emergency room and it went away while I waited like 4 hours to be seen. When the MEPS doctor saw it on his computer, he just wanted some details and then after that told me that I won’t need a waiver since it happened 15 years ago and didn’t need meds or had a reoccurrence
Oh man here's a good one that actually argued in defense of Genesis (not that I like it). I went to basic with a mentally handicapped guy, should have never been allowed in. When I say handicapped we literally had to help him dress in the morning, get his name tapes on the right side, tie his boots etc. that was in reception. We go off to basic and naturally he's always fucked up and it was the week before the range and we're all like bro they're actually gonna give this guy live ammo. Well one day his platoon was being smoked and he just stands up and the drills are like "ay what the fuck are you doing get the fuck down!" And he says "No I quit!" And they said "what do you mean you quit you can't just quit what the fuck are you gonna do after dropping out of the Army!" He replies "I'll work at McDonald's!" They say "wtf do you mean you'll work at McDonald's how're you gonna support a family" to which he replies "I don't want a family!" And subsequently he got let go before they ever gave him live ammo, I can believe a shit bag recruiter letting him slide but the fact he made it through MEPS is incredible I mean you only needed to talk to him for about 30 seconds to see he wasn't very bright. Always wonder what happened to him.
I hope he's happy at McDonald's.
Shoot, he's probably treated with more respect and paid more there.
Yeah I remember his last name, I'll have to look at my yearbook to see his first name, I know I've looked him up before and I've never found a social media but I'm not sure he could set one up anyhow
I honestly thought this was going to be a private Pyle copypasta until I got further in.
Sounds like the Army was trialing McNamara's Morons 2.0
I tried to join back in 2022, and had 2 different recruiters tell me not to bother/it’s not gonna happen with childhood leukemia on my record (I was 16). Took talking to a War College Fellow on our campus, who talked to a buddy somewhere, who asked a recruiter in my area to put together my OCS packet. We worked for ~7-8 months getting med docs and waiver approvals and doctors recommendations before I could even submit the packet. All that and they are still telling kids whose mothers got them an adderall prescription in middle school to get fucked. Bullshit
The Guard recruiter told my son that 90 days off of ADHD medication is all you need now to get a waiver.
It took my a year and a half to enter. Started in 99 and entered in April of 01. In my youth I got in with the wrong crowd and had plenty of misdemeanors. Went to join army and marines said no due to my record. Went back to court with the same judge had everything set aside/expunged. Army recruiting said no due to previous knowledge but let it go up the chain for approval. Eventually again said no. My father 22 years in the army 17 of them in oda asked his friends to write a letter on my behalf. E9s, 06s and higher, W5s as a testimony of my character an everyone was in awe. So of them were in the ranger hall of fame, Richard Carmona (surgeon general) and many more. Again came back as no. Went to my congressman and launched a inquiry and finally I got a maybe. I had to pass an interview with a major and if he signed off then I'm in. Walked into his office told him about my past and how I am now. But it lasted about 15 minutes and he said yes. Recruiter was surprised but did my paperwork and boom was at 30th ag for basic. Once completed and checking into bragg I did feel very embarrassed due to my folder I was carrying around. Everyone's was this with initial paperwork but mine was thick and very noticeable. E-5 looking at my paperwork was like how did you even get In? I told her persistence. Then she removed all paperwork and shredded everything that was not needed and was basically a fresh start. I did 10 years both active and guard. 2 combat deployments OEF1/OIF1. Then transfered to the guard since no bonuses were being given out during my window of reenlistment.
This story actually made me smile. You did everything right and won in the end!
I appreciate it. It was a Very long experience but I preach to the current generation on how you and your friends can mess up your goals. But the army gave me everything to make me successful in the civilian world. Have me the confidence to ask or the local prom queen when in leave. She became my wife and now hand 6 beautiful kids 5 girls 1 boy. And now 16 years later still together and opening up my own telecom business.
I would be curious to see the math from recruits who failed out of basic, AIT or med board within the 1st year in the military both before and after the start of genesis. Were there more Soldiers failing out medically in basic, AIT, 1st year of service before genesis? Because one could argue genesis is doing its job screening medical issues if the numbers have dropped. If they've gone up or relatively stayed the same, then its just another hurdle to join the service. *See the meme of guy put pole in his own bike tire while riding it.*
I saw a guy saying there was a higher number of people joining to purposely get medically retired, not sure how big of an issue that was. Seems like something they could easily look into even before Genesis. They signed over the rights for them to get those records.
Can someone tell me why Gensis is such a problem child? Explain it like I'm 5
It makes it significantly harder for recruits to hide disqualifying conditions. The minor stuff that everyone used to lie about now appears in the system, forcing people to get waivers. Not everyone is willing to deal with the waiver process, and of course some get denied.
My thing is, I didn’t even lie about my conditions before Genesis. Still got in because they didn’t fully check records. I would’ve been a DQ with Genesis. That’s my main issue with it.
Genesis reveals your entire *recorded* medical history to Army doctors. There are a lot of disqualifying conditions and, more importantly, conditions that require evals and waivers. This takes a lot of time and energy to process. Waivers are not quick. Applicants lose interest. In the before before times, some of us joined by being less than honest with recruiters. That is no longer possible.
So this software accesses health record databases, populating someone’s past medical history? Seems like that approach would bias for applicants without previous healthcare access, not necessarily just healthy candidates.
Bingo.
I still don't get it. Medical paperwork is so silo'd and much of it is not accessible. How does genesis get all this data?
Filing a HIPPA form and it pulls it all, from what I can tell
Medical records have been digitized since 2010ish….
It doesn't. Contrary to what people think, there's a ton of information it does not find. If I recall correctly there's a group of participating insurance companies. If you got care outside of that ring, you're a ghost. Just because things are in a computer doesn't mean magic happens.
The system itself isn’t “bad,” but it disqualifies people for things that only affect them on paper. Lot of past conditions are getting people DQd, requiring waivers which often get denied. The reason people used to just lie before is because the conditions weren’t actually affecting them. Can’t do that anymore.
Me, point in case. I got diagnosed with asthma as a kid. I was a varsity distance runner in high school with no problems. Recruiter said not to use the “A” word at MEPs. I didn’t bring it up and never had problems in the Army. Now, somebody with a history of schizophrenia who has been prescribed meds for it, they’re gonna get flagged and they should. It almost always comes out in BCT and it wastes everybody’s time. This system would be a total win if this was the only people who it caught. The waiver process is well intentioned. “Hey potativated, you said you had trouble breathing as a kid. We want to make sure you’re fine now and you’re not going to keel over from an asthma attack at mile 2 of your first ruck March in BCT. Go see your doctor, get him to do a breathing test, record the results, and send them to us.” Here’s how the system actually goes. “Hey potativated, we’re going to need your doctor to perform a test to measure your breathing. Oh, you have the test finally. Oh, see, this is the wrong one. Here’s the one you’re supposed to do. Oh, you did it, well, that’s not the right form. We’re going to need your doctor to fill it out on this form. Oh, you’ve got it on the right form? Well we’re actually going to need it from a specialist. Oh, you’ve got the right form from the right specialist? Great. We’ll review this and let you know the outcome.” Every “Oh” in this requires another visit to your doctor. Getting anything scheduled with a doctor these days is already months. And doctors visits aren’t cheap. Their reviews can take months as well. Also, what happens if people actually want to go through the waiver process? To meet numbers, the Army *needs* Soldiers who need waivers under Genesis. Are they going to plus up the people who process these waivers? Or are they going let them get completely backlogged worse than security clearance reviewers were in 2017?
It knows all your naughty secrets that the government doesn’t approve of.
It defacto punishes you for having an thorough medical history.
[удалено]
In my day you could just lie and if you weren't a TriCare kid/didn't have something obviously wrong with you they'd just let you through. Which is what the recruiters depended on. Now they can't do this anymore.
You can't just "sit down and say no to everything"
It’s an electronic medical records system. It’s Cerner rebranded. Most medical records are digitized / electronic so these systems are able to aggregate them so you can see a persons complete medical history. It doesn’t rely on a person bringing hard copies to a new medical provider or system or having them faxed over. For the most part you can no longer hide parts of your medical record-it’s all available. EPIC, Cerner they can all access each other and other systems
Hey buddy! Genesis is a big bad monster that eats kids with asthma.
As others have said, Genesis reveals a lot of records that were generally ignored or lied about before. Of course Genesis isnt the real ‘bad guy’ behind the problems, and puts the real issues into light - the general health in the US, which you could argue where that comes from. It’s just easier to point to a single thing like Genesis and say that it’s the problem instead of digging deeper.
I mean, pretty good ACFT score and ASVAB score but uh....what did Genesis disqualify for? There are many waiverable conditions unless you were like that one guy that had scoliosis, and a bevy of mental issues trying to go to OCS.
My buddy got in with scoliosis
Same I had scoliosis with no waiver when I came in prior to genesis.
https://www.reddit.com/r/army/comments/18ekwpg/genesis_is_100_the_reason_for_the_recruiting/kco8fwy/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf&context=3 Answered in another comment. Nothing quite as bad as that guy, but still one of the big no-no’s in Army’s eye. As I told the other person, he’s also already done the gas chamber with no issue. Asthma has been a dirty word to the army for a long time, but how bad is it really in this case?
I’ve seen sweaty palms DQ someone.
They fear his natural lubrication
Slippery gentleman rise up
So the problem isn’t genesis, the problem is the fitness standards in 40-501 that need to be updated.
That as well. I think they’re too black and white. If we updated the body comp program to factor in physical fitness, why not do the same for medical conditions? Someone who’s performing past the level you want them to perform at deserved a closer look.
They actually update these frequently (every 2-3 years) , but if they’re in the reg, there is usually a medical reason for it. But I do think the waiver process could be much faster.
I can't say this enough. It's confounded by medical personnel who will will always side with caution in interpreting those standards. Genesis is just a system that searches for data points. How those data points are interpretated and enforced results in the problems. The bureaucracy of needing and attaining or denying waivers is the most broken thing I've seen with no fix in sight. Add that even when a waiver is given, if it takes more than 45 days the applicant more often walks because a lot changes in their lives in 1.5 months. This was one sticking point I had with the Army G1, especially since the Army's competition in low skill service industries will hire you in minutes to days of applying. They felt "dedicated applicants" should be willing to stay the course. Pretty big disconnect.
Honestly, I’m a big fan of the “fat camps.” I had to lose weight to join, but I was in way better shape walking into the recruiting station than a lot of the skinny kids who showed up to OSUT. I think we lose out on a lot of solid applicants because they’re overweight but don’t have the resources/environment to get that situated.
That’s a good point too. It took trying to lose only 20lbs for me to become sympathetic to overweight people. That shit was hard, without guidance. And expensive to eat healthy.
LYING TO RECUITERS IS A RITE OF PASSAGE!! WHY ARE KILLING THIS TIME HONORED TRADITION?!
Army (the DOD as a whole really) tends to overcorrect. And yeah, some recruits have died in training due to things they lied about (or were told to lie about) and things that were diagnosed. But at the same time we all know the DOD will just lower standards when push comes to shove. Even if a draft were somehow passed next year, the DOD couldn't take 2/3rds of the 17-21 year olds due to education, obesity or health. So the nonsense as shown on this thread shows how stupid the DOD has become. Okay, some kid was treated for a condition years ago - but they are not taking meds for it now. Kid had a broken bone - fine, 18X is out of the question but 42A or 92Y shouldn't be. As always, common sense just seems to elude the DOD.
My son runs a 6 minute mile, 5'10 about 190 lbs, redneck working man build..... Has wanted to join his entire life but can't because he has crohns. Which can be managed with his own shot every 8 weeks or so, meanwhile certain job fields are legit filled with people on the spectrum. makes sense
The reality is that the DoD realized there was an X amount of people lying and getting into the services just to get medically discharged. These people are provided (rightfully) VA services. This is the number crunchers seeing a red value and trying to reduce it. The DoD has many ways it could solve this: One is by streamlining the waiver process and/or automatically waiving stuff in Genesis. Instead of half fixing the system, fix it all the way. Someone diagnosed but not treated for X years? Immediate referral at MEPS. Still treated? Have a path to contact their Primary Care to see if they can get a waiver. We put a BK in Afghanistan and Iraq logistically we should be able to solve this issue in house. Two, realize that the pool of Americans is, in fact, smaller than what it actually is for military service and start to care about QOL issues for the juniors they’re attempting to enlist and commission. Maybe PVT Joe will come into the service if they’re guaranteed to not be serve crap and live in squalor supervised by a 21 year old that runs fast? Maybe LT Jane will stay in past their ADSO if they aren’t raked over the coals by their superiors? Three, we continue to harass the recruiters and put hands to ears and eyes to blame them instead of attempting to fix other systemic issues plaguing our services?
This is exactly it. Blame overinflated VA disability claims.
Genesis is the symptom, the actual problem is the absolutely ridiculous standards for getting in. A middle school precautionary prescription should not disqualify someone. Issues that are fine while in the service but not before is ridiculous. Removing genesis will only put a bandaid on this issue. Fixing MEPS medical process is the actual fix we need. Boomers checking our buttholes aren't helping either
Spot on. We should not be DQing people for conditions that we allow after enlisting. If the big concern is money, we’re already used to telling vets not service connected, so flag them and make sure the condition isn’t service connected.
I’d take a weaker Soldier that might struggle with the job over a person that might need a “morality”wavier.
If I tried to enlist now and not when I did 15 years ago I wouldn't have been DQ lol. I did fine in the army the 8 years I served.
Any history of mental health issues
The perspective I was presented with was that Genesis is meant to avert disability payout to those who should’ve never enlisted in the first place due to having something in their medical history that could potentially qualify them for disability after enlisting (versus having a disability stemming solely from something service-related). It’s like the MCU’s Project Insight, but in a medical sense.
How big of an issue was that though, that they now are turning away people who would've been fine and unnoticed 5 years ago
Without the data, we can only speculate and ask ourselves if the trade-off is/was worth it.
USAREC must be more of a shit show now than when I was in. I’ll pray for you brothers and sisters on recruiting duty.
Imagine that kid walking in your door and you thinking shit, easiest and most qualified person I’ve ever seen. Then boom, DQd for a very borderline condition.
An absolute morale nuke.
Did you shave today? https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-army/2019/09/05/army-launches-inquiry-into-how-teen-with-autism-and-arm-disorders-was-recruited/
Jesus 💀.
I lost it at the recruiter ghosting and unfriending him on Facebook. Mad grimey yo. 💀
Genesis contributed, but even beforehand we were doing really shitty. Dm me if interested in more
Lol I remember when I joined in 2020 right before genesis became a thing, we were sitting in this room filling out medical history and under surgeries i started writing down my wisdom teeth extraction from like ten years earlier. Then the lady said if you write something down you have to put down the doctors info and all this other shit lol… I was like hell noooo and crossed that shit out lol. She didn’t even question it.
There's multiple things that come into play when you're selecting somebody to enlist or commission in the Army. Medical history is an important part of that. We all make jokes about people with Autism joining MI, but there are people that have medical conditions that aren't "high functioning" or are just incompatible with military service. So if somebody lies about their medical history and joins, maybe they make it through an enlistment, maybe they don't. Maybe they "Develop" their condition they joined with while they are enlisted, and now the Army can be on the hook for it down the road through medical retirement or medical discharge, etc. There's also federal law at play here, the government decided that certain medical conditions prohibit you from military service. Now Genesis has the ability to pull from all these medical databases whereas they mostly relied on applicants to be honest and provide them with their records if they had something that was potentially disqualifying. Add to that how many recruiters were like "Don't ever bring this up" under the old system, because there wasn't a means to detect those records back then. Now they can see everything that's been documented and uploaded to the national healthcare computer systems, and it's limiting a lot of people that might have joined otherwise. Genesis isn't the only reason, hell, I don't even think it's the main reason. One of the biggest reasons we are in a recruiting crisis is the internet. Just spend a day going through the /r/army reddit. All day, all week, all year you can just find story after story of people getting fucked down by their commands, people not getting paid right, people in charge ignoring rules and all the other fucking horrible stuff we see in this sub every day. *Rarely* do we see anything positive, like the guy that got to go shoot gunnery last week. Occasionally you see some positive stuff from the mods, or people that are editors at Army times and whatnot. But the average joe user? It's fucking *rare* that you see an Army praise post. Potential Soldiers see this shit. They see the social media posts from their friends. They see all this stuff and rarely do they see any positives. The Army is tackling some quality of life stuff, but they are doing a terrible fucking job showing that to the populace.
Those are both good scores. If a recruit had those scores, and recently was an inpatient for a mental health episode, I would DQ them as well.
Nothing with mental health, and nothing “recent.” It was for something that occurred 5 years ago.
….Maybe AR 40-501 needs revision and not genesis….
Uhhhhh a history of expressing interest in murdering colleagues, especially when under stress.
Yeah the waivers take forever too
this is a refarded take. he's smart and strong why does it matter that he hears voices telling him to kill people?
Blame inflated VA disability claims for GENESIS.
The scary marijuanas!!!
Might be a weird question but is there anyway for me to check what Genesis would pull up for me? I wanna join after I finish my degree but don’t know if it’s a waste of time since I had Asthma when I was like 8 and was on Prozac from 4-6 💀
If you haven’t had any clinical encounters for asthma after age 13 you’re good. As far as checking what it sees, just assume it can see all of your medical history. Also if you’re getting a degree, consider going Officer. And Air Force…
In 2005 I tried to enlist in the army, crushed my asvab. Unfortunately i did a lot of drugs in the 90s and came clean about it during interviews and drew a evaluation by a psychiatrist who said I wouldn’t be able handle the military and was DQ’d. still pisseed about it, if I could have done it over I would not mention a peep about past drug use, let alone volunteer it.
I EPTS a handful of kids every cycle because their asthma starts becoming an issue. I've been a recruiter and a Drill Sergeant. I had the same frustrations as you. I'm sure genesis is a HUGE problem for a lot of recruiters. PT stud in one of our platoon went down during the 2 mile and we had to get him E911 out. Just because it wasn't an issue that one time he took the ACFT doesnt mean it won't show up.
Unprecedented, changing times require unprecedentedly low standards. My friend joined at 34, and basically fulfilled a lifelong dream. He said that the kids they're recruiting now are bottom of the barrel. The reception barracks sounded like prison.
Pretty sure we were failing the recruiting mission long before Genesis was a thing. Sure it's a factor, but it's not the only reason.
This is how you know that Army leaders don't really care about army end strength. It's all about short term OER bullets.
Had Asthma as a kid, like most pre-genesis recruits, was told not to mention it when I got to MEPS. almost 23 years later almost exclusively in FORCSCOM with seven deployments not a single issue. Does sma\_pao or whatever the account is still monitor these kinds of posts???
Not necessarily Genesis per se, but the fact that the list of disqualifying conditions set forth by DOD is longer than Tolstoy's *War and Peace*. Genesis just makes it easier to catch 'em. It seems DOD wants all applicants to have had a perfect clean bill of health for their entire life with nary a scratch at the time of enlisting.
Did he take adhd or anti depressant medications after the age of 10?
I had childhood asthma and I got in, had to take a pulmonary function test and a methacoline challenge test and MEPS accepted the results
Sounds like something the Army would do.
[удалено]
All valid points. The Army is acting like the hottest girl in school right now, when they really can't afford to be so picky right now.
I went to MEPS and a consult as vision was my only issue. They fucked up with my astigmatism and I noticed the doc also put in the wrong diagnosis code that corresponds to a retinal detachment. I fucking swear I never ever had that, nor does it match with my most recent records and I’m meeting a civilian eye expert. I’m sort of on a similar boat as you are. Good luck OP.
Submit current PFT and send the waiver?
Failed the methacholine challenge by 1%. It was more than likely his allergies and not asthma, considering the lack of asthmatic symptoms following. Pulmonologist’s notes were ignored on that matter though.
Yeah, if Genesis was around when I enlisted I would’ve needed a couple of waivers. I’m allergic to bees and actually had a reaction I went to the hospital for three weeks before I went to MEPs. I got stung by a bee in the field once and my doc just gave me a handful of Benadryl after I begged him not to tell our PSG. But besides that I never had an issue with it.
Sickle cell? Mental health disorders, diabeetus
that’s just an objectively false statement. genesis might be to blame for recruits not making it past meps but that doesn’t account for how many people consider joining, then hear stories about the conditions soldiers endure and decide to not even step foot into a recruiting office
Without knowing what the disqualifying condition is its hard to give a real opinion on this. Theres quite a lot of things that wouod be completely reasonable. You could do both of those things and be bordering on renal failure, or have an arterial stenosis that could become a heart attack at any moment. They could be have been diagnosed schizophrenic. Diabetes, autoimmune disorders, cancer. All of things are diseases you could have while still being smart, strong and fast at one snapshot moment in time. I agree with you that Gensis is a problem, well more accurately the DODs perceptions of what conditions are unfit for service are a problem that was masked by incomplete records but one of those is easier to solve than the other. But the bottom line is that just having a high ASVAB and high ACFT does not mean you're medically fit for service.
Bro eczema?? You could be a stud with pt and intellect and still have a skin condition that would absolutely fuck you up in the field
I put a dude in that had history of Asthma. All we had to was take a pulmonary functions test, get medical records and pharmacy records and the doctor approved his waiver.
I’m convinced this is tied to the VA. They already don’t want to acknowledge or pay you for anything when you get out. Everything is preexisting and the military didn’t do anything to you. Take me for example I joined at 17 with no medical issues. Sincerely I didn’t have anything when I joined. Once I got out they blamed everything on preexisting before I joined the service. What they couldn’t blame on that, they blame on pregnancy! Now they’re trying to catch it on the front end. Identify all of the preexisting conditions and you won’t have to pay them when they get out. They’re shooting themselves in the foot because they can still be paid if the service makes the condition worse, which we all know it will. In the meantime, we will continue to make it damn near impossible for people to join. Right now it takes more than 3 weeks for someone to join due to this system. Putting more recruiters on the street isn’t going to help. One of the only insurance carriers Genesis doesn’t talk to is Medicaid, because of course we want the poors to still join!
I'm not familiar with Genesis (I got out years ago), but I assume it integrates with the major medical networks and pulls the complete records?
Leave Phil Collins out of this