Picard, what you point out is what happens in business. Offshore medical schools are a fully mature industry; initially there weren't that many but now you have quite a few of them. It will become the battle of the fittest. State Boards are already tightening it up but so will residencies and clinical sites. Only the strong will survive. The biggest 'leveler' though is going to be financing medical educations; if you don't have a funding source as a schools, you'll have problems. Some of the schools are big enough to perhaps get in the lending game themselves aka DeVry/Ross, SGU but most are at the mercy of the open money market.

The world is becoming smaller. You can read an article today on a medical school in Samoa(like I posted) where in the past it would have taken weeks for it to show up. People can make informed decisions quicker. Boards like ValueMD make it better too. There is no such thing as a 'medical student' who didn't know; they can learn just about all of the good and bad things about a school by just perusing the boards.

In business when there are too many price cutting comes but also quality prevails........choose one's school wisely because if you make a mistake you'll have a Yugo of a Medical degree like Kigezi,etc.

azskeptic

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Moderator - State Licensing Forum

Still skeptical after all these years.
This is it. There are no hidden meanings.WYSIWYG

http://www.internetmedicalschool.homestead.com

http://www.chiropractormds.homestead.com/index.html

Okay, since the sky is falling and nobody has any constructive comments, only negativity, let me try:
One solution for the smart IMG is this: Get licensed in a state that still grants licenses for IMGs in 2 years, there are still a few. (Hint: IMG's do lots of clinical rotations in such states.)
Then the IMG can start looking for an attending position starting in 3rd year like everybody else.

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Saba Forum Moderator
Saba University School of Medicine, MSIV
Interests: Pediatrics, Psychiatry

I had a "enlightening" moment the other day when I saw a patient in the hospital (not my patient) wearing a T-shirt that said "My doctor killed more people than my Colt .45" Sadly, I think the T-shirt has alot of truth to it.

Medicine is a business, and just like any other business, it's coming under tighter scrutiny nowadays. It's just a reality. And offshore IMG's are easy targets because we all chose these schools because we didn't get into the traditional US establishment, for whatever reasons. This is why I tend to talk about big pictures that will impact IMG's in the years to come.

You don't see me jumping onto threads that argues over heating systems in classrooms or toilets that don't flush... Yes, these are important issues for students that are in the middle of it. But overall, it has very little impact on your survival as an IMG. Yes, schools must have a minimal standard in physical facilities to pass any accreditation evaluation. But that's the easiest part... it only takes money (and god knows these schools make alot of money). Problems relating to physical infrastructures can be easily corrected with money. And complaints from current students will do much more good than bashing from outsiders like us -- this is why you don't see people like me jumping on St. Chris's thread about no heat in classroom or SJ's thread on toilets not working... Ten years from now, these will be fun stories that students will tell their kids... "When daddy went to medical school, we had to.... XYZ." My wife and I laugh about going to classes all sticky from not being able to rinse off soap/shampoo after morning shower because the water pressure cut out in our old dorms during our first year of school. Annoying as hell when we were students. We laugh about it now... It has no impact on our medical licensure.

However, issues like where you did your rotation, how the rotation is contracted/affiliated/set up, school charters, internet instructions, residency placements, USMLE passrates... etc. These are big deal issues that directly impact your survival as an IMG. The BIGGEST ISSUE being the pending positional statement by FSMB on offshore schools and the tremendous national drive to regulate these offshore medical schools targeting "US rejects." And make no mistake about it, the intent by the "established US medical community" is to regulate these offshore schools out of existance! So, it's in an offshore school's (ANY OFF SHORE SCHOOL) best interest to meet LCME-style standards ASAP... not 3 years from now, not 5 years from now... it may be too late by then... And it doesn't need to take the form of any "major policy change" by any medical boards to have servere existance-threatening impacts on offshore schools. It can take as little as a policy change by ECFMG to decide not to issue ECFMG certs or allow USMLE registration from schools deemed "unaccredited" by FSMB's positional statement. That's all it takes to spell disaster overnight. Is that what's going to happen? Who knows, but knowing what I know now, I wouldn't want to bet my career on it if I were an offshore medical student now. Since graduating from medical school, I've seen first hand the creation of two new US medical schools -- Touro university's two osteopathic schools in California and Las Vegas -- they have their own growing pains, but when they opened their door, they had already met the US accreditation standards. I have a feeling that offshore schools will be held to the same standard in the very near future. Again, the next 5 years will be interesting times for IMG's...

P

__________________
Jean Luc Picard
Academic Hospitalist/Assist. Professor of Medicine, Star Fleet Medical, Earth, United Federation of Planets
Borg-Certified... Resistance is Futile.

In Glock, We Trust... Everyone Else... Keep Your Hands Where I Can See Them.

http://www.odmp.org/search.php?searc...=2001&cause=27
http://www.nypdangels.com/wtc.htm
http://www.hampsteadnh.us/police/A%2...ica%20Died.htm
http://longmontpolice.com/MEMORIAM.HTM

It's still that way for board certification in Psychiatry or Neurology. You also can't have any licenses that have been suspended or revoked in any state.

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Saba Forum Moderator
Saba University School of Medicine, MSIV
Interests: Pediatrics, Psychiatry

That may be....I wouldn't risk going to St. James.

But what about students who go to the CA approved schools of SGU, Ross, AUC, Saba?
And what about the fact that the physician shortage is predicted to increase dramatically in the next several years?
Won't hospitals be forced to increase residency spots?
Time will tell, I suppose.

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Saba Forum Moderator
Saba University School of Medicine, MSIV
Interests: Pediatrics, Psychiatry

That is funny...and a lot of truth behind that...Thing though is, my doctor probably saved more life than his colt .45

"The toll taken by guns in America is enormous:

30,000 dead every year.
60,000 to 100,000 permanently injured every year.
$2-4 billion in health care costs annually.
$100 billion in lost productivity and indirect costs
A society fixated on crime and the fear of crime."

-silentmarch.org

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Carpe Diem
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St. Matthew's University School of Medicine
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I'll try not to turn this thread into a gun debate 8)
Having carried a gun on and off since my early 20's -- both as a law enforcement officer and now as a ex-cop civilian, my gun has definitely saved my behind more times than I can count. No, I've never discharged my weapon in the line of duty or in "other-than-range situation," but I've been shot at, and had to challenge a few BG's at gunpoint...

Anyways, my point with the T-shirt is to show the public sentiments towards the healthcare professions nowadays. More and more patients are checking out their doctors like they would check out cars before they buy them. Some of my patients not only know where I went to medical school, where I did residency, the date of my initial medical licensure... some even knows informations such as my "ratings" by various groups that keep track of things such as CHF re-admission rates, acute MI death rates... etc. Physicians are increasingly coming under scrutiny... And given this current climate of scrutiny, it's not hard to imagine that offshore medical education will soon come under the microscope of various regulatory agencies...

P

__________________
Jean Luc Picard
Academic Hospitalist/Assist. Professor of Medicine, Star Fleet Medical, Earth, United Federation of Planets
Borg-Certified... Resistance is Futile.

In Glock, We Trust... Everyone Else... Keep Your Hands Where I Can See Them.

http://www.odmp.org/search.php?searc...=2001&cause=27
http://www.nypdangels.com/wtc.htm
http://www.hampsteadnh.us/police/A%2...ica%20Died.htm
http://longmontpolice.com/MEMORIAM.HTM

I think the Rules are changing for many states, but their will always be states that will accept unapproved schools. I think the next few months will be very interesting for Offshore medical schools. SJSM is improving their facilities with the cadaver labs supposed to be complete at the end of March but I think that SJSM needs to improve much quicker and take a more aggressive role in getting it's standards up to par. I will be keeping my ear to the road to see any changes in the near future and will make the appropriate changes in medical schools if necessary.

Frankenstone

__________________
I am older than I look.

How are you going to change the medical schools? Ask nicely?

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Saba Forum Moderator
Saba University School of Medicine, MSIV
Interests: Pediatrics, Psychiatry

wolfgang, i think what frankenstone meant was that he'll make a change to switch to a different medical school if need be.................

and to frankenstone........i don't know how u'd do that........b/c ever med school except for st. james and xavier need 1 year of organic chem/bio chemistry, 1 year of chem, and 1 year of bio. u said earlier that the reason u went to st. james is b/c u didn't finish these pre-requisites.