PLAINVIEW, Texas — Family nurse practitioner Saul Gamboa has been a nurse for over 10 years.

“It’s one of the things I aspired to be,” Gamboa explained.

But Gamboa didn’t get his start the traditional way like a lot of nurses do.

“I initially got my start in the military,” said Gamboa.

Gamboa is a Sergeant in the US Army Reserve.

He’s a combat medic and has been all over the world including two tours in Afghanistan.

“During my deployment to Afghanistan we’re in the middle of nowhere,” explained Gamboa. “And there’s not a lot of medical assets so you’re kind of an expert for everything and anything medical.”

Sgt. Gamboa says medical work with the military is similar to a lot of things he sees at his clinic in Plainview.

“Dealing with stress is obviously part of it and being in the medical field and being a nurse in general is very stressful,” Gamboa said. “So it’s good training just to have the experience of being in the military and being in high stress situations.”

And that experience he says pushed him to pursue his dream of becoming a family nurse practitioner to help people in his community.

But he says he can’t imagine a day he wouldn’t also be a soldier.

And thanks to Covenant Health, he’s able to still do both.

“Being in the military is my crowning achievement,” Gamboa said.