LOL...its funny to hear of the monday for the clinical fair only...I remember one time, everyone was so geared up for the fair, and how shocking it was that all at once, the room vacated of hospital reps...leaving many students standing around in the room saying "where did they all go?" ...until a staff member volunteered "they're going on their tour now...the buses are waiting outside for them". Priorities, priorities...made quite an impression on the students! They had alot of meals and activities planned for the reps...

Anyways...you will eventually get a list of all the start dates for the various clinical sites, dont worry. And it wont just be one U.S. spot, and a zillion UK/Ireland sites. That much I can reassure you. There will be several U.S. sites, and each site has several start dates. Also, remember that everyone has a different date set for their Step 1, and different plans for starting their clinicals. I know of tons of people who had no plans to rush right into clinicals as soon as their test was over...and also many people who studied for several months before taking their test. So its not like your entire class will be rushing out for that one U.S. spot you were hoping for, on the same date you wanted. I hope this is somewhat reassuring.

It is true that if you dont have 8 wks of clinicals in the semester time following your 5th semester, you wont get financial aid. How long were you planning to study? If you want to take a couple of months to study, then you might as well go stay with family/friends, and start a semester later, for financial aid reasons. If you're wanting to start right away to keep finaid, and make sure you make your match, etc, then those priorities you have might warrant 10 months of cores in the UK/Ireland. Its all in how you feel you want to prioritize things - its totally personal. Staying in the States means your score must be back before starting (UNLESS you start on your psych rotation - where a score back isnt needed, but having sat for the test IS needed).

One thing is for sure, dont take your time on this until spots are filled by those who made up their minds early. Once you decide where you want to go, and set your Step 1 date...let Phil Green know about it. He can tentatively slot you in, and make it permanent after your passing score is in. Otherwise, go for the UK/Ireland!

One more thing...please dont think the UK/Ireland is a bad thing...we're in Ireland right now, and it is awesome. We LOVE it here. Your cores will move smoothly from one into the next, and you'll have them all done in 10 months. There's nothing wrong with that! Not to mention the fun in experiencing another country before we have to settle down to life in the States. Just give all your options careful consideration. Its hard to believe someone when they say "dont worry"...but Phil has turned out to be pretty truthful in what he has recommended to us, and now its my turn to say "dont worry". As you're studying for Step 1...all this sort of fades away.

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Moderator - Spouses and Partners

OOPS! This was supposed to be a reply to another poster "mushiecookie". Oh well...I wanted to also mention that all of the info is a "SO FAR" experience. If anything changes, I'll let you know.

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Moderator - Spouses and Partners

What about the supposed December 2004 change where everyone has to have scores back before starting any clincals? Do you know if this is still the case? I will be sure to ask either **** Schnatz, Phil Green, or Victor Hidalgo at the upcoming hospital fair.

that is true. starting jan 1st 2005, you must have a passing score submitted before you can start clinicals. this prevents any students starting a clinical rotation and then finding out that they did not pass step I. this was announced to the fourth semester class the last time that dr. schnatz and phil green were here at auc (about 2 months ago).

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AUC, Class of 2007
Internal Medicine (PGY-2)

Since 2002, they've said the same thing "you have to have your scores back before beginning clinicals, as of upcoming January" and every year, they've not enforced that. According to the folks here in Ireland "we dont care anything about those scores, they dont affect anything with us, you can come without them as far as we're concerned". So its an AUC policy. Lets see if they finally enforce it as of this January 2005!

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Moderator - Spouses and Partners

Wow!!!! this sounds almost exactly like what happened today!!!!!
I guess they have lots of practice at this.

hey Jules, is there any way you can post a few more impressions and/or pictures? Lots of people are now considering Ireland and what not and probably would love to see/hear what it's like over there.

Thanks!

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Finally beat Super Mario Bros within 7 mins.

IRELAND CLINICAL ROTATIONS INFORMATION FOR SPOUSES/FAMILIES

Why Ireland?
We chose Ireland for core rotations because a) rotations could be started as soon as Step 1 was completed b) financially, it is a good choice for those with families due to Irish stipends and cost of living c) it provides a great lifetime experience for the family d) there are opportunities to travel further from this area, and visit some incredible areas around Europe and the UK from Ireland.

Getting to Ireland
While the time to travel to Ireland is significant, and the jet-lag associated with it was not easy on our family, the trip was a smooth one for us via Air France. You can fly to any major European city, then onwards to Dublin, or you may fly into Dublin or Shannon directly from the U.S. The cost is not more than it would be to fly to other U.S. cities, if you watch online for airfare deals/sales. Aerlingus, Irelands airline company, does offer deals online. The Holiday Inn Dublin Airport was a good, comfortable and affordable hotel for us upon arrival. The cab to the train station was not very long, and the sites were great. Once at the train station, we easily found the ticket counter, and purchased a one-way train fare for the whole family for about 50 dollars. The train ride was about 2-2.5 hrs long, and beautiful. Just inside the train doors there is a shelving unit that will hold luggage from floor to ceiling. There are tables with bench seating, which held our family of 5 easily…or you can take up tables across the aisle from each other. The windows are large and great for photos during the ride. In Waterford, there are several hotels to choose from. We chose the Woodlands Hotel, on Dunmore Rd. The hospital is up the road from the hotel.

Housing
The real estate agents here are called “letting agents”. There are several letting agencies. The one we dealt with is called Book-a-room, and can be reached online via www.bookaroom.ie. The agent we like most is named Regina. There is another online agency www.castle-estates.ie, where you can actually view some of their properties for rent on the website. Something interesting to mention about housing in Waterford, is that there does not appear to be any significant difference between renting a small apartment, or a larger house. It’s a matter of choice. The rental prices here for the most part seem to range between 700-900 euros per month. Most of the students rent houses here, and there are several areas within walking distance to the hospital to choose from. The houses are usually townhouses here, but all of them have a front and back yard, usually fenced in, and with a shed. You can rent a furnished house or apartment. The linens and towels don’t usually come with the house, but the large and small appliances do. The furniture, cutlery, dinnerware, pots/pans, vacuum, iron/ironing board, tea pot/kettle are considered standard furnishings in a rental unit. What is NOT considered to be a regular provision is a coffee-maker. (PS, our house is a large 5 bdrm, 3 bath, and we pay 900 euros/mo fully furnished)



Utilities
They use a combination of electric and gas or oil for utilities. Water here is free. The billing here is bi-monthly, and much cheaper than St Maarten. You will likely have gas and electric. The homes have radiators to heat the house. The houses also have fireplaces in them. Most kitchens feature dishwasher/washing machine/dryer/microwave. Stoves are electric. (PS, our first electric bill, for two months, was 88 euros, not bad for a family of 5)

The Hospital
We have taken a walk to the Waterford Regional Hospital, and located the AUC Student’s lounge. We met up with a few AUC students in the hallways. The hospital is clean, attractive, and the people seemed quite friendly. From a spouse’s point of view, that’s really all I can say. My husband enjoys his clinicals there so far. He has to be in by 9am M-F, and returns home from between 2-4pm each day. Students will be given an “on-call” weekend every so often, but not frequently. Students can choose to go in on weekends or after hours if they want to. There are many “Bank Holiday” weekends here in Ireland, where students don’t go into the hospital. These are great weekends for family time, and for touring around a little bit.

Schools
Waterford has a lot of schools. They register their children for school early here. If you think you want to come to Waterford for clinicals, consider contacting schools to register your children. Some of the recommended elementary schools we have been to are: Faithlegg, Waterpark, St John of God, St Ursula’s, and Ballygunner. There are many others, but after many discussions with the local families here, these are recommendations we received. They are all “junior schools”. They don’t have “grades” but rather “classes” here. Instead of kindergarten and 1st grade, they have junior and senior infants, and 2nd grade is equivalent to “1st class”.

Cars
A used car here can be obtained for relatively cheap if you search the bulletin boards at the hospital, the newspapers, the used car lots, and check with the AUC students who are preparing to leave Waterford. You have to keep insurance, road tax payments, and a current inspection sticker. These are not cheap, but you cannot get away from them. Road tax payments can be made in installments. (PS, we paid 300 euros for a used car, Toyota Carina)

Phones
They have two large cell phone companies here: O2, and Vodophone. The deals they offer are very similar in cost. You can get prepaid cell phone minutes just as you did in St Maarten. Incoming calls are free. For landlines, the set up is extremely fast and easy, from your own home, from minute one in the new house! You have to plug in a phone into the wall jack, then dial “1901”. A customer service rep from Eircom will answer and set up your service for you. It will be working right away. You should ask for your acct number, and jot it down somewhere. Also, when you receive a flyer in the mail from a company called Vartek, sign up for it! It’s a service offering calls to the U.S. for .6 cents per minute from Ireland, with no monthly fees or connection fees. All you pay for are your calls.

Internet
Using your account number from when you signed up for your landline, dial “1901” and ask for internet services. You can have them set you up online right away, for dial up. We still don’t have dsl, but they continue to tell us they are going to be checking our line for dsl capability. In the meantime, we use dial-up. (PS, we pay 29.99 euros per month for 150 hrs of dial-up per month, anything over that we would pay by the minute – there are different plans).

What to do in your spare time
Ireland really does look like the typical photos you see of the country. You can take long country drives and see all sorts of castle ruins, abbey’s, and old cathedrals. Waterford is also on the coast, and a 10 minute drive will take you to breathtaking scenery. We purchased a Heritage Pass for our family, for about 50 euros, and it allows us into all the heritage sites in Ireland for a year. It’s a perfect ticket into all sorts of castles all over Ireland, and we have already visited 3 gorgeous castles.

In Waterford, there is a park for kids to play for hours, called People’s Park. It’s a very big playground area, newly built here. The grounds of the Park are vast, and kids can run and play until they can’t run anymore! There is a mall in the City Center, with an underground parking area. On the streets around the mall, there are quaint shops and a cobblestone area where cars are banned from driving. There is a McDonalds and Burger King in this area, and many shops to browse in. There are second-hand shops here as well, which are great places to find kids toys/clothes for a great price! They only sell things in great condition here as well.

There are excellent buses going along Dunmore Rd to and from the City Center area, and they run right by the hospital. The bus is reliable, clean, and safe. The price for an adult is 1.20 and .80 for kids.

If you have questions about the stipend available to those with families, please email me, and I’ll tell you all about it. The amount is significant, and warrants a second look at doing cores in Ireland, if you have children!

If I can be of any help to you, please email me at Julestx@hotmail.com http://groups.msn.com/drslaughterstmaarten

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Moderator - Spouses and Partners

that was an excellent post

Thank you Jules!!! It's great to hear that things are going well for all of you. Thanks for the information. Can you let me know which elementary school you choose and why? We have also been interested in going to Ireland when the time comes. It's reassuring to hear good things.

Kimberly

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Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get.

HI. We talked to so many people, and everyone kept telling us that for girls, the St. John of God school was absolutely the best. So thats the one they'll go to in Sept. All the schools require uniforms. All the schools also teach Irish/Gaelic to the kids for a little while each day. This should be fun!

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Moderator - Spouses and Partners