Discharged for stress fractures?

Would the Air Force discharge someone who completed BMT but cannot go to Tech School because of multiple stress fractures in their legs? He does not want to be discharged and he says there are a number of Airmen in Medical Hold d/t stress fractures. Is there any reason they would force him to be discharged? We presume he is healing, but what if it takes too long?
Additional Details
Thanks for the input. He scored very high on the ASVAB and has been assured by his doc that he should heal. He's currently home on convalescent leave and is scheduled to go back to Lackland soon for evaluation. They told him he most likely would go to tech school after that, but I was just concerned they might d/c him if he didn't heal quickly enough.

The doc will make the final decision as to whether or not he can perform his duties, do PT and things like that.If he cannot, if it is something more then just stress fractures, or whatever, he will be med boarded out. As long as he heals he should be fine.

Croaker

I got shin splints that resulted in stress fractures in bootcamp in the marines.

i never told anyone until i was out of boot and then went and saw my family doctor on leave before going to my next school. I haven't heard of being discharged over shin splints

Archangel

There has to be more to it than that. A lot depends on what his AFSC was supposed to be and when the classes are open. It also depends on what the physical requirements of that AFSC are going to be. If the medical folks have determined that he will have the same trouble again in the AFSC he was supposed to be in, then they should have been working on a reclassification for him. If his ASVAB scores are not good enough for them to find something for him that he could do or the class start date is about a year away, then he could be discharged. They aren't going to pay someone to sit around on medical hold for a year with no training. The longest I have ever heard of someone getting hurt in BMT and staying in was 8 months on hold. However, that person was in a guaranteed job for a critical skill and the tech school itself was going to be a year long.

mnbvcxz52773

My experience is in the Army, but I imagine the Air Force is not much different in this aspect.

It depended on how long it takes to heal. If it takes more then six months, they may be discharged and sent home, however, once they are healed, they can come back. This could be done either through a discharge, or administrative leave (leave with no pay).

If it is less then six months, they will probably keep him in.

Depending on the severity of the fractures though, he could be medicaled out entirely. For example, if it was a femoral head stress fracture, they probably will get discharged (this example is most common in females though). Femoral head fractures do not heal well, are easy to fracture again, and can put a person in a wheelchair for life.

Again, my experience is with the Army, so take it for what its worth.

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