UK service personnel medical discharges: financial year 2023/24
This official statistic provides information on medical discharges among UK regular service personnel. The bulletin focuses on medical discharges within the most recent financial year including demographic factors and the medical causes leading to the discharge, as well as providing time trends for the last ten years.
When a medical condition or fitness issue affects a member of the UK armed forces, their ability to perform their duties is assessed. If they are unable to perform their duties and alternative employment within the armed forces is not available, personnel may be medically discharged. Medically discharged personnel leave the armed forces prior to the completion of their contract and may be entitled to additional payments as part of their military pension.
The medical reason for the discharge is recorded and categorised. It is possible for personnel to be medically discharged for multiple reasons
Abstract: This research set out to investigate the experiences of ‘grown up’ children from armed forces families, to gather their reflections on childhood and education, and to seek their advice to inform the current armed forces community, policy-makers and practitioners. The Service Children’s Progression Alliance (SCiP) defines a child from an armed forces family as “a person whose parent or carer serves in the Regular Armed Forces, or as a Reservist, or has done at any point during the first 25 years of that person’s life” (SCiP, 2017: para 2) and the Office for Students refers to this definition in their documentation relating to student characteristics (OfS n.d. para 8, see also OfS, 2020: para 11). In this research we use the term ‘grown up’ to indicate individuals over the age of 18 recognised to have reached the legal age of adulthood in the UK. This group of individuals are currently overlooked in research, policy and practice as the focus continues to be on serving members of the armed forces, veterans, and families, including school-aged children.