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UHSA is very stringent on its clinical componant. It requires its students keep track not only of the number of weeks they rotate in a specialty, but also the number of hours. Surgery for example requires 9 weeks and 520 hours. If it takes 12 weeks to complete 520 hours, the hours requirement still has to be satisfied. The school expects a student to rotate an average of 60 hours per week. Hours and weeks have to be documented by the preceptors. In contrast I met a great number of United States grads who had a mix of easy and hard rotations. I don't know of any United States medical school that has as stringent requirements for rotation.
I did all of my core rotations in ACGME greenbook hospitals. I had great instructors. Ex. my pediatric preceptor was the neonatology instructor at an ACGME residency. My general surgery preceptor is a surgery instructor at a ACGME residency program. My internal medicine preceptor also teaches medical students and residents at a United States medical school (MD program). All of my rotations including electives were done in teaching facilities except for a couple of electives (like an out-patient psychology rotation).
I got to do a good number of procedures in medical school rotations. Things like complete small in office surgeries like removing lipomas or punch biopsies. I got to insert nasogastric tubes, cauterize the nose, do injections , shave biopsies, freeze actinic keratoses, do exams, admit patients, discharge patients, perform EKG's, write prescriptions to get signed, run and interpret Toki in obstetrics, do fetal doppler assessment, anoscopy, and more. I got to first assist in many c-sections, lap choleys, thyroidectomies, breast biopsies, mastectomies, appendectomies and more. It certainly was not just shadowing.
I passed all of my USMLE exams , and am ECFMG certified. I applied to a little more than 50 family medicine residencies. I got 18 interviews. I got 2 prematch offers and accepted one of them. I know of a great many of my classmates as well as upper classmen (this refers to women as well) that are in residency around the country at this time. I personally know a number who have graduated , completed residency and are now licensed fully in the United States. I know several who were previously chiropractors, or podiatrists and did the advances standing version of the program and are now fully licensed in one state or another.
The school is not like other Caribbean schools as it does not just cater to United States students who could not get into a United States school. Its goal is to be an international school that trains doctors to serve in underserved areas. Our class president is now fully licensed in a rural underserved town in the west. Students are not just from Antigua and the United States but from many countries, for example in Europe and Africa and have returned home to practice medicine.
Last edited by RoHudTuffy : 02-19-2008 at 01:19 AM.
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