Tailoring Medical Standards for Air Force Personnel

To serve in the U.S. military, individuals must meet medical standards to ensure that they are fit to serve. The minimum medical standards are set by the U.S. Department of Defense, and the individual services establish additional standards for specific career fields or occupationalcategories. To ensure that the Department of the Air Force can access and maintain personnel in critical skill areas, the Office of the Surgeon General in the U.S. Air Force expressed interest in exploring alternative ways to use medical standards and employ new methods to help assess and align personnel to career fields and jobs. This report explores the cultural implications of tailoring medical standards to expandor limitthe pool of qualified personnel to Air Force culture. This report describes work that should be of interest to military policymakers and researchers involved in setting and evaluating military medical standards and selection processes.