Requirements to become Belgian Dr. from non EU

[ABCmedgirl]

Hi, I'm new to this but i'm in desperate need for some accurate information. I'm a non-traditional med. student. I'm an American citizen who will be graduating from med. school in China. I'll be graduating with an MBBS (equivalent to an MD). I am looking for information about how i would go about becoming a doctor in Belgium and furthering my education in Belgium (specializing). (1) I know for the U.S. I would have to take a series of exams (the USMLE's), is there an equivalent to that for Belgium? (2) If I want to also specialize, if there is a medical licensing exam, do i need to complete it before I can take courses to specialize or can i begin courses before? (3) Does anyone have any advice/ tips/ suggestions of which universities may offer international programs for specializing? I am currently trying to contact an advisor from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven as i heard they have good programs. (4) Also, is there a special list that the medical school needs to be recognized by (as is for the U.S.)? (5) My boyfriend is Belgian and he said you don't have to know French or Flemish to work as a doctor in Belgium, but i've read that you do; i want to know if that is true?
Thanks! Any info relative to this would be much appreciated!

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[john182]

Hi, I'm new to this but i'm in desperate need for some accurate information. I'm a non-traditional med. student. I'm an American citizen who will be graduating from med. school in China. I'll be graduating with an MBBS (equivalent to an MD). I am looking for information about how i would go about becoming a doctor in Belgium and furthering my education in Belgium (specializing). (1) I know for the U.S. I would have to take a series of exams (the USMLE's), is there an equivalent to that for Belgium? (2) If I want to also specialize, if there is a medical licensing exam, do i need to complete it before I can take courses to specialize or can i begin courses before? (3) Does anyone have any advice/ tips/ suggestions of which universities may offer international programs for specializing? I am currently trying to contact an advisor from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven as i heard they have good programs. (4) Also, is there a special list that the medical school needs to be recognized by (as is for the U.S.)? (5) My boyfriend is Belgian and he said you don't have to know French or Flemish to work as a doctor in Belgium, but i've read that you do; i want to know if that is true?
Thanks! Any info relative to this would be much appreciated!

It is possible, but you will need to contact each hospital individually. Graduating from outside the EU, and not being an EU citizen will be the main obstacles. You will usually need to demonstrate B2 level competency in a language to work in an EU country; it will be easier to learn French to this level while abroad than Flemish obviously.

You contact *all* of them. As you are non-EU for university and immigration status you should not be picky first off - just try and get in somewhere. The first step will be demonstrating tha your degree is equivalent to a basic medical degree in Belgium. Then, you will need to find the process for registering in Belgium for doctors graduated from outside EU, who are not EU citizens.

The Ordre des Médecins oversees registration it seems.

 

[slight365]

It's always fascinating how the language, if at all present, is the last thing on these lists of requirements, when they are often the hardest thing to master.

Your boyfriend is Belgian, eh? He might have forgotten to tell you how 60% of Brussels is muslim and speaks any of various languages, such as arabic. Also, Brussels is officially French speaking. Then there's a region in the east that the Belgians love to forget, where they only speak German- another headache for the government. Then there are the Dutch in Belgium, further complicating things and using their own language freely. Belgium is fairly nationalistic about the language usage. As far as him telling you that you don't need to know the language: there is a war being fought right now, in part, due to language, which will break the country north and south, yet he's telling you that you dn't need to know their languages? Are you sure he's telling the truth, or being a bit overzealous to get you to move there with him?

Everything starts from the language. You can have everything before it, but you would probably be surprised at the number of people who fail at the language, underestimating the importance and difficulty. Then in practice, people just try to reach a "good enough" level, not realizing they are going to be taking someone's life into their own hands, and are gambling with language being "good enough". I had it out with someone here in the last year who disappeared. His plan was to go to Germany and then the language would have been easy. When you're responsible for lives, your language can't be "good enough", as evidenced by the recent case about a german doctor who essentially murdered a british patient while moonlighting in the UK. Not only was his training faulty, but his language abilty amounted to negligence. Now in this case, we have someone with goals to work in a country with a different language, wanting to explore how to work in a life and death field which is dominated by communication, without knowing the language?

Stunning.