Originally Posted by DrArora

On top of the basic sciences, nd also study acupunture, physical medicine, botanicals. So they take 9-10 courses and this leaves little time to be good in any of the basic sciences of physiology, pathology, microbiology, biochemistry, anatomy.

Yes, it is very intense. Naturopathic medical school was a true survival school for me - I had 30 credits generally every quarter. If I had 28 credits I considered myself very lucky - time to sleep! And yes, I got to master ALL of the subjects that I covered. I came to the US with the completed medical degree from Ukraine and can say with certainty that my education at naturopathic medical school was absolutely comparable (minus major surgery) to my education from a traditional medical school.

Naturopathic Living - Family Practice of Dr. Nadia Arora

Originally Posted by teratos

What is so naturopathic about Levofloxacin?

What about drug-herb interactions? Most have NOT been studied. That leaves them wide open for lawsuits. Testosterone is schedule III (same as Vicodin) Absolute insanity.

G

Originally Posted by DrArora

... Only in the second, third and especially, fourth year I started feeling firmly on my feet. We started our class with 127 students and graduated 16. Our school allows the 5-year option, so the majority of the students switched to that to lighten their load, but at least 40-45 students dropped out of the program because of its difficulty. ...

Originally Posted by dt

Are you sure they dropped because of the difficulties? I have heard that many students were not happy about Bastyr's clinicals and the woo-woo stuff ("new-agey" as one called it). How many transferred to National or Southwest?

Originally Posted by DrArora

... We started our class with 127 students and graduated 16. Our school allows the 5-year option, so the majority of the students switched to that to lighten their load, but at least 40-45 students dropped out of the program because of its difficulty. ...

Originally Posted by dt

Let's see...

127 - 16 - 45 (let's say) = 66 switched? Really?

How do you know that 45 dropped because of difficulty of program? And not due to other issues?

Did Bastyr not screened their students well before admission?


Also, could you tell me what your clinicals were like during 3rd and 4th year? Was each student clinician fully booked each shift with external patients (ie, not Bastyr ND students)? What type of cases did you see? And how often? How long were each shift? How many patients per shift on average would you say?

Did you do a ND residency? For how long? and where?


I am curious what a ND training is like compared to a MD.

Originally Posted by DrArora

I prefer not to address the first half of your post, as it seems that you have your opinion set already, plus you appear to read only selected sentences from my responses. You may believe whatever you want. I know what I know and it is not my intent to convince anyone.

Regarding clinicals - there were two shifts per week in 3rd year and 4 shifts per week in 4th year. In 3rd year all shifts were in Bastyr Center for Natural Health. In 4 year - at BCNH, plus at least 2 external clinical shifts were required - those were in community clinics, shelters for homeless and clinics for underserved/uninsured/low income population. In my last year the shift at Highline hospital oncology clinic was available. All shift were 4 hours long. At Bastyr, we saw 3 patients per shift. The first 30 min of the shift were for preview and the last 30 min were for review. Yes, we saw Bastyr students on our shifts, since clinic provides full health care to the Bastyr students for a very nominal cost. So, if a Bastyr student had pharyngitis, or pneumonia or needed PAP, we saw them. Other patients: all conditions and all ages. Mostly chronic conditions, such as diabetes or hypertension. HIV patients, cancer patients that were coming for adjunct treatment to help to minimize the side effects of oncological treatments - those would fly from all over the country for this type of care. Pediatric patients with asthma, dermatitis, allergies, ADHD, obesity, failure to thrive, infections; in need of vaccinations or regular pediatric exams. Many of the patients, including pediatric patients had primary care doctors in our clinic, so they would come for the annual visits or with acute complaints. This list does not at all provide a full description - generally, the care at BCNH that we provided was a full spectrum of family medicine.
In the outside clinics we saw more patients- visits were shorter and we had from 6 to 8 patients during the shift. The spectrum of conditions seen depended largely on the clinic - in community clinics we saw all the cases typically seen in primary care; in shelters - infections, including STDs as well as progressed cancers: most frequently, melanoma, breast, cervical and colon cancers.
I did not do the ND residency - it is optional for licensing at this point, plus, there is not enough available positions. Currently all residencies are at the teaching clinics of the naturopathic schools and they can only provide positions for 4-6 students a year. Hospitals are not our options yet, since MediCare does not recognize NDs - the AANP is working on it, so it may happen in the near future. Bastyr is working on the developing the nation-wide residency program, as far as I know, they will have more positions available this year already.
We were also required to complete at least 125 hours of preceptorship - internship in external clinics with either ND or MD or DO. I did mine in Polyclinic Pediatrics with a group of MDs ( there I completed over 800 hours) and with 3 separate naturopathic clinics, one of which was also for pediatric patients.

Also, you did not answer my question - how do you have such detailed info about ND schools?

Nadia Arora, ND
Naturopathic Living - Family Practice of Dr. Nadia Arora