M. Richard Fragala Defensive Medicine: A Career in the Air Force [Military Psychiatry]

I was a most unlikely career military person, but having received a draft notice at the beginning of my senior year of medical school in 1968, I thought I would make some inquiry as to the training options available. I learned that if I opted for the Air Force at that time, I would be assured an internship at that service's 700-bed Wilford Hall Medical Center in San Antonio, along with an opportunity to compete to remain for residency training thereafter. At the height of the Vietnam War, the possibility of being able actually to complete a

I was able to complete residency training, and was assigned, as I'd requested, to the hospital at Andrews Air Force Base. Six months later, the prisoners of war were released from North Vietnam. The opportunity to work with this group of individuals, some of whom had been held captive for up to seven years, was an extraordinary experience, for which I remain very grateful. After only nine months, however, the person who occupied my current position as consultant called me one day and asked, "Do you like Chinese food?" I thought he was going to invite me to dinner. When I said I did, he replied, "That's really good, because you're going to be living on Taiwan in six weeks."