Should military personnel be entitled to breast enlargement?

[Shannonigans]

Be all you can be....? What do you think? Should plastic surgery be allowed with the military health benefits that we're paying for and they don't have to pay for?

At first I thought it was kind of stupid that it was allowed because their health insurance is paid for through the government but then DH pointed out that a lot of the surgery is 'training' surgery for doctors.

What do YOU think? If it is available, should it just be for those in the military or spouses as well?

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/07/21/military.perks.reut/index.html

[kingclick]

Only reconstructive. Not elective.

[Peanut]

For the actual expense of such surgeries to the average taxpayer, why the hell not? As posted, a lot of this is training for physicians in the military. Believe it or not, they have to "practice" for doing a decent and adequate reconstructive surgery in the case of either battle wounds or breast removal due to disease. Just as the military should have on staff at least one doc who can do a decent nasal reconstruction or what have you. If I want to allow the doctor to perform his/her first ever boob job on my bod, why not? Believe me when I state these cases are very few and far between and nowhere near as prevalent as the mainstream media would like you to believe.

I have heard rumors to the effect that one COULD get such things done, but it isn't as if we are all lining up at the clinic waiting for brand new DDD's and outpatient free lipo. TOTAL GOSSIP ALERT: I have also heard that if one should desire such surgery, the actual cost of the implants/devices possibly needed outside of the normal scope of routine military medical supplies (I suppose for things like the cannulas for lipo???) must be purchased IN ADVANCE by the recipient. Of course, this is all different installation gossip, so please do not etch it on my tombstone or anything like that.

Furthermore, it is not as if every physician in the military medical system is educated and trained to perform such surgeries.

I would much rather these individuals gain their practice with willing and elective patients who understand the possibility of ending up somewhat lopsided although admittedly larger than end up momocking some innocent reconstructive surgery patient who only desires to look "normal" again after mastectomy or mortar round.

[Jory]

My first knee jerk reaction to the question was HELL NO! But, peanut makes some good points.

[Demona]

Aren't large breasts somewhat of a disadvantage in the military? Certainly I've heard of naturally large policewomen having huge problems with getting bullet proof vests and other equipment to fit, not to mention the back problem caused by large breasts.

[Keri]

Well from one military spouse I will say NO THANK YOU. I do not wish to be some military docs guinea pig. I loathe going to the doctors on post for non surgical issues. I certainly do not want them to make my hooters any bigger. YIKES :nono:

[Peanut]

Well from one military spouse I will say NO THANK YOU. I do not wish to be some military docs guinea pig. I loathe going to the doctors on post for non surgical issues. I certainly do not want them to make my hooters any bigger. YIKES :nono:

I am right there with you, Keri, on that vote of (non)confidence.

I've heard of naturally large policewomen having huge problems with getting bullet proof vests and other equipment to fit, not to mention the back problem caused by large breasts.

Yes, Demona, large breasts can be considered problematic, but at least for the US Military, I am more concerened with troops in live-fire zones even RECEIVING adequate "bullet proof vests" (body armor) than worrying about whether or not the one they receive actually fits. Since many of our troops in dangerzones actually BUY THEIR OWN ARMOR in order to have sufficient protection, I am certain their bust size is merited in on their selections.

As I posted previously, boob jobs are SO rare through the military hospitalsit is almost laughable this is even an issue. Recruiters are using this as a tool to recruit young members of the IBTC? If that is the case, then these gullible gals have bigger problems than tiny boobies.

Of all of the RUMORED (few) boob jobs I have heard of on different bases, most if not all were officer's wives and not active duty members. And the one and only verified boob job I am aware of was on a wife--not active duty(we worked out and showered together), they paid a civilian doctor to do it for her.

Of course, my dh is in the Air Force, maybe the rubber titties are free as can be for the other branches, flowing like milk and honey. Oh, well.

[kingclick]

Frequency does not negate the fact that this is taxpayer money that should not be spent on elective surgery.

I gues next we should allow for penis enlargment surgery too. Because in the case of a guy getting his bits and pieces taken off it's good practice for the Doctors.

How is this for an idea. Send our military doctors out and give them better training than "on the job guine pig training".

And I find it ironic that you would mention that "body armor" isn't paid for. But boob jobs SHOULD be paid for.

That is some MESSED UP priorities that the military has.

I will never accept elective cosmetic surgery for our military.
I will never accept that our troops have to purchase their own body armor to protect themselves while they protect MY freedom.

[Peanut]

Frequency does not negate the fact that this is taxpayer money that should not be spent on elective surgery.

And I find it ironic that you would mention that "body armor" isn't paid for. But boob jobs SHOULD be paid for.

That is some MESSED UP priorities that the military has.

I will never accept elective cosmetic surgery for our military.
I will never accept that our troops have to purchase their own body armor to protect themselves while they protect MY freedom.

It is actually more a problem of the budgetary restrictions placed upon the military than a problem of "messed up priorities". The military pretty much has to use the budgetary funds allocated to the different areas, or else face the chance of LOSING those funds in subsequent budgets. If there is "fall out money", and the medical folks decide to use that to provide elective surgery and training in reconstructive procedures, so be it. Use it or lose it seems to be a catch phrase heard ayt the end of many fiscal years.

Don't approve? Contact your congressperson and ask them to change the allocation of the defense budget to accomodate supplying adequate body armor for the active duty members' UN-enhanced breasts.

Let the people who can change things know you aren't supportive of the "use it or lose it" budgetary procedures. Problem is, in order to make their funding last through the year, military branches and divisions and on down to anyone who uses the defense budget for their moneys scrimp and save all year long, never knowing what they may be called upon to do throughout the fiscal year to be covered. Come the end of the fiscal year, the so-and-sos (weather people, support folks, intelligence, cavalry, reconstructive surgery departments, ANYONE) find out they have $XXX left, and if they DON'T spend it, not only do they lose that money, but in addition they will NOT be allocated that same amount for the next year's budget.

I bet if information or details regarding such procedures were to be released to the general public, one would find the majority of non-reconstructive and electiove surgeries are done at the END of the fiscal year, when the surgical folks who receive training to do such procedures face "use it or lose it".

Yes, it quite frankly sucks. However, how can we change it? Oh, I know...let's just cut all "perks" and "benefits" and basically just slash the defense budget. Shit, we don;t need medical care, anyway, and after all, the numbers of uninsured in the general public are high enough we can use this plastic surgery BS to just further reduce the standard of living for active duty members and their families. All they do is support and defend our country, anyway.

[Peanut]

Frequency does not negate the fact that this is taxpayer money that should not be spent on elective surgery.

And I find it ironic that you would mention that "body armor" isn't paid for. But boob jobs SHOULD be paid for.

That is some MESSED UP priorities that the military has.

I will never accept elective cosmetic surgery for our military.
I will never accept that our troops have to purchase their own body armor to protect themselves while they protect MY freedom.

It is actually more a problem of the budgetary restrictions placed upon the military than a problem of "messed up priorities". The military pretty much has to use the budgetary funds allocated to the different areas, or else face the chance of LOSING those funds in subsequent budgets. If there is "fall out money", and the medical folks decide to use that to provide elective surgery and training in reconstructive procedures, so be it. Use it or lose it seems to be a catch phrase heard ayt the end of many fiscal years.

Don't approve? Contact your congressperson and ask them to change the allocation of the defense budget to accomodate supplying adequate body armor for the active duty members' UN-enhanced breasts.

Let the people who can change things know you aren't supportive of the "use it or lose it" budgetary procedures. Problem is, in order to make their funding last through the year, military branches and divisions and on down to anyone who uses the defense budget for their moneys scrimp and save all year long, never knowing what they may be called upon to do throughout the fiscal year to be covered. Come the end of the fiscal year, the so-and-sos (weather people, support folks, intelligence, cavalry, reconstructive surgery departments, ANYONE) find out they have $XXX left, and if they DON'T spend it, not only do they lose that money, but in addition they will NOT be allocated that same amount for the next year's budget.

I bet if information or details regarding such procedures were to be released to the general public, one would find the majority of non-reconstructive and electiove surgeries are done at the END of the fiscal year, when the surgical folks who receive training to do such procedures face "use it or lose it".

Yes, it quite frankly sucks. However, how can we change it? Oh, I know...let's just cut all "perks" and "benefits" and basically just slash the defense budget. Shit, we don't need medical care, anyway, and after all, the numbers of uninsured in the general public are high enough we can use this plastic surgery BS to just further reduce the standard of living for active duty members and their families. All they do is support and defend our country, anyway.

[kingclick]

Yes, it quite frankly sucks. However, how can we change it? Oh, I know...let's just cut all "perks" and "benefits" and basically just slash the defense budget. Shit, we don;t need medical care, anyway, and after all, the numbers of uninsured in the general public are high enough we can use this plastic surgery BS to just further reduce the standard of living for active duty members and their families. All they do is support and defend our country, anyway.
Wow. Talk about an all or nothing reaction.

Oh, your gonna take away our boob jobs!! Well why don't you just take away ALL our medical benefits!!!!

[Peanut]

Wow. Talk about an all or nothing reaction.

Oh, your gonna take away our boob jobs!! Well why don't you just take away ALL our medical benefits!!!!

You know, after I posted that, I knew you would take it that way. My intent was to possibly teach you a small bit regarding the standard operational procedure (no pun intended), budgetary-wise, for almost any defense-budget funded area of the military. No comment on anything else, just knee-jerk to the conclusion. What about where I state...

Let the people who can change things know you aren't supportive of the "use it or lose it" budgetary procedures. Problem is, in order to make their funding last through the year, military branches and divisions and on down to anyone who uses the defense budget for their moneys scrimp and save all year long, never knowing what they may be called upon to do throughout the fiscal year to be covered. Come the end of the fiscal year, the so-and-sos (weather people, support folks, intelligence, cavalry, reconstructive surgery departments, ANYONE) find out they have $XXX left, and if they DON'T spend it, not only do they lose that money, but in addition they will NOT be allocated that same amount for the next year's budget.

I bet if information or details regarding such procedures were to be released to the general public, one would find the majority of non-reconstructive and electiove surgeries are done at the END of the fiscal year, when the surgical folks who receive training to do such procedures face "use it or lose it".

[Echo2]

Here's a unique idea. Why not be financially responsible with the tax payers money and still help those who are injured and need the surgury. Don't let military women get boob jobs UNLESS they have been injured an need reconstructive surgury. And when that .0000000001% of military women need a boob job, contract it out to a private physician.

Is this too simple for our government to figure out?

[Peanut]

Here's a unique idea. Why not be financially responsible with the tax payers money and still help those who are injured and need the surgury. Don't let military women get boob jobs UNLESS they have been injured an need reconstructive surgury. And when that .0000000001% of military women need a boob job, contract it out to a private physician.

Is this too simple for our government to figure out?

Apparently so! Good idea, though. Except for the fact that it is hard to get a qualified plastic surgeon into a battlefield hospital in Afghanistan. Know anyone who might be interested? :shrug:

By the way, I DO feel it is a preposterous situation, supplying elective cosmetic surgery to the general military population. Maybe the inanity of it all is why it is so damned rare in the first place?

[kingclick]

As far as I know. The need for a breast implant can be delayed until they return home.

[Echo2]

The plastic surgury done to help war victims is not done in the field. Field medicine is resricted to necesity. Everything else is done after the injured soldier gets removed from the hot zone.

I don't know what group of people are tryng to get this nonsense passed but they have a very bad case of cranial rectitus.

[Peanut]

I don't know what group of people are tryng to get this nonsense passed but they have a very bad case of cranial rectitus.

I wonder if the extreme temps cause hair loss and how long before they will also offer hair restoration "therapy"? LOLOLOL It isn't a matter of having it passed, it is actually taking place already, albeit relatively rarely.

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/content/?040726ta_talk_schaler:
There has been a great deal of speculation recently that the government might reinstate the draft at some point, in order to replenish the nation’s armed forces. Military and government officials have, for the most part, dismissed such talk. As Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said in an interview the other day, “We’re perfectly capable of increasing the incentives and the inducements to attract people into the armed services.” For years, the military has offered its recruits free tuition, specialized training, and a host of other benefits to compensate for the tremendous sacrifices they are called upon to make. Lately, many of them have been taking advantage of another perk: free cosmetic surgery.

“Anyone wearing a uniform is eligible,” Dr. Bob Lyons, the chief of plastic surgery at Brooke Army Medical Center, said recently, in his office in San Antonio. It is true: personnel in all four branches of the military and members of their immediate families can get face-lifts, nose jobs, breast enlargements, liposuction, or any other kind of elective cosmetic alteration, at taxpayer expense. (For breast enlargements, patients must supply their own implants.) There is no limit on the number of cosmetic surgeries one soldier can have, although, Lyons said, “we don’t do extreme makeovers in the military.” The commanding officer has to approve the time off for any soldier who is having surgery. For most procedures, there’s at least a ten-day recovery period, and while soldiers are recuperating they’re on paid medical leave rather than vacation.
and...
A Defense Department spokeswoman confirmed the existence of the plastic-surgery benefit. According to the Army, between 2000 and 2003 its doctors performed four hundred and ninety-six breast enlargements and a thousand three hundred and sixty-one liposuction surgeries on soldiers and their dependents. In the first three months of 2004, it performed sixty breast enhancements and two hundred and thirty-one liposuctions.

Yes, it IS asinine. But the truth of the matter is, they have to maintain proficiency. The only person I know who may or may not have had elective "plastic" surgery through military medical channels had jaw reconstruction done, and let me tell you it only made her less-than-heinous due to her extreme overbite and general ugly personality. This was justified due to "bite issues" in order to make it easier to repair her bite with braces.

However, as stated before, I have heard rumors and such. Yes, it is ridiculous. And yet I still can see the necessity to maintain proficiency.

Furthermore, I have to say that living the life we lead as military families we face our own differing levels of stress and such. I will not say we "deserve" such surgeries...but I will say it is just one of those things that may or may not be considered part of a trade-off situation. One cannot equate lipo or boob jobs with the availability of a strong/extended family support structure, but why the hell not? There are soooooo many things the average civilian takes for granted that simply cannot be due to the lives we lead...

Even something as basic as knowing that I could not possibly call my mom, (who lives thousands of miles away), to come and watch the kids while I have to make an emergency trip to the ER for a sliced finger while my dh is deployed to XYZ is the sort of thing I am talking about. Let me tell you right now I have spent the night in the home of new neighbors I barely knew because of the wife's gall bladder attack emergency, and have spent several hours in an ER with my own two children and the three of the sliced finger, playing games and reading books and supplying snacks to all five kids while my friend had her finger stitched up.

And so, we military families learn to take care of our own. It is a different world. Believe me when I state that the fake boobies are far more rare than the press would like you to believe, and more of the wives who will admit to having them will also gladly offer you the card of the CIVILIAN doctor who "did" them for them ON THEIR OWN DIME.

If we are going to bitch about problems with military budgeting and procedures, lets focus on the really important things, like the lack of adequate body armor, the need for better gas masks, and all the assholes in the chain of command being rewarded merely for their strength in placing their sinuses so far into the sphincters of the nearest higher ranking individual. Focus on the troops in stressed (shortmanned) career fields) being promoted not becasue of proficiency but merely because of the critical shortage of the individuals in the next rank up.

Better yet, let us focus on the retention of the highly trained mid-level troops, both officers and enlisted, who are becoming disenfranchised by the high ops tempo...and you know what? If that means an occasional boob job to keep themselves or their wives happy while they play geographical single parent for the NEXT deployment three months later, what the hell. The cost of the surgeon's time will be paid anyway, as a military doctor, and if Sgt. Jones wants to come home to DDD's, who am I to judge? Plastic boobs and smaller thighs all around, if it means happy troops doing a proficient job and staying in the military long enough to change this crap from the outside in, as opposed to civilians pissing and moaning to their congressperson that it isn't fair that Mrs. Sgt. Jones gets free lipo through the Army channels...

[Peanut]

from
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,129466,00.html

'Bullets Not Boobs' Campaign Launches
Thursday, August 19, 2004

LOS ANGELES — Be all that you can be - and no more. That's the message the owner of an adult video company wants to give women serving in the nation's armed forces, where they can receive free breast augmentation, liposuction and other cosmetic surgery from surgeons honing their battlefield skills.

Mark Kulkis on Wednesday officially launched his "Bullets Not Boobs" campaign at a press conference outside a military recruiting center in Hollywood.

Kulkis, who employs only "all natural" actresses in his films, said he will give $500 in lingerie and a day at a spa to any woman honorably discharged from the military with her natural breasts intact.

Flanked by porn star and erstwhile gubernatorial candidate Mary Carey (search), he presented the campaign's first award to a 23-year-old former Army specialist from Texas for sticking with her B-sized bust during five years in the service.

"We think the military should be spending its money on bullets, not boobs," Kulkis said. "To counter the Army's offer of plastic beauty enhancement, I decided to offer a natural beauty enhancement."

Military officials confirmed that their surgeons, on a very limited basis, practice reconstructive surgery skills on enlistees and their dependents if time and space is available. The military doesn't use cosmetic surgery as a recruiting tool or publicize it among service members, said Martha Rudd, an Army spokeswoman.


Recipients must pay for their own breast implants but the surgery is covered, according to a Department of Defense statement. The department is currently reviewing its policy on elective cosmetic surgery, the statement said.

The New Yorker, which reported on the surgeries in its July 26 issue, wrote that between 2000 and 2003 Army doctors performed 96 breast enlargement surgeries on soldiers and their dependents. In the first three months of 2004, they performed 60 breast enlargement operations, the magazine reported.

Jennifer Zandstra, an Army test equipment calibrator who was honorably discharged two weeks ago from Fort Hood, Texas, was the first to contact Kulkis after a friend saw his Web site. Kulkis says four to five other women are in line to receive a similar reward.

Zandstra, who had to submit proof of her honorable discharge and a picture of her unaltered chest to Kulkis, flew to Los Angeles from her hometown of Commerce, Texas to receive her prize. Zandstra said she had heard about the possibility of free plastic surgery while in the Army, but didn't give it much thought. Now, she plans to buy her lingerie at Victoria's Secret.

"I'm happy with what I have. If there's anything I want to change, I'm sure I could change it myself," she said.

As a military spouse, I just wish he would make an offer like this to me, as well...free lingerie for just being me, unaltered? :smileyhap :smileyhap