Hi guys! I'd like to ask for your opinion on something (maybe it will help distract us from all of this waitlist watching).
In addition to my position on the UW waitlist (21, so I'm cautiously optimistic), and admission to one U.S. school that I can't possibly pay for, I've also been admitted with advanced standing to medical school in Switzerland. The main advantage to going in Zurich would be that tuition is negligible compared to US schools--something like $1500/year. My husband (he is Swiss) also has a good job here, and you are paid for your work during clinical years, meaning that I would not only avoid debt from medical school, but could probably pay off my undergrad debt soon as well.
School here technically takes 5 years--but I added it up, and that includes about 21 months of vacation (4 in summers, 1 month in the winter, plus Christmas and Easter breaks). That would give me at least some time to do rotations in the U.S. and visit friends and family back home.
The disadvantages, of course, include being away from home for so long (home is the Seattle area). The students will also be quite a bit younger than I am, as they begin directly after high school, and school will be mostly in German (which I speak, so that isn't that bad). The main thing, though, is that apparently it will be getting much harder in the coming years for grads from abroad to land residencies, as the number of medical school spots is increasing, but residency spots are not.
Anyway, I'm interested in your opinion(s) on whether it would be worth risking a harder time finding residency in order to avoid the kind of debt that most med students graduate with? Especially as I will probably decide to go into primary care, not having debt after residency would give me a lot of freedom to choose a job for the work, as opposed to worrying too much about money.
Thanks for any advice.
See you in August!
