just a thought...

Started by gkalra
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gkalra

Full Member
10+ Year Member
i don't understand why it matters so much which university you come from.. at the end of the day isn't it all supposed to boil down to how much knowledge you have rather than who outcompeted who? and an MD degree should be considered equal no matter which institution it is from..
our goal should be to learn as much as we can to help patients in the future.. not to get into the "top ranking" school just for the name and status behind it...
 
gkalra said:
i don't understand why it matters so much which university you come from.. at the end of the day isn't it all supposed to boil down to how much knowledge you have rather than who outcompeted who? and an MD degree should be considered equal no matter which institution it is from..
our goal should be to learn as much as we can to help patients in the future.. not to get into the "top ranking" school just for the name and status behind it...
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It matters because I have seen some very poorly trained medical students, almost all from international schools or some DO schools.. Not all MD or DO degrees (or MBBS, or other) are equal. There is uncertain oversight of many international schools. Although you'd think that USMLE, or LOR's, might help me tell those who are well trained from those who are not, they don't. Most of the allopathic US Medical schools generate high quality students. International and some DO schools, not so much. That's why it matters.
 
aProgDirector said:
It matters because I have seen some very poorly trained medical students, almost all from international schools or some DO schools.. Not all MD or DO degrees (or MBBS, or other) are equal. There is uncertain oversight of many international schools. Although you'd think that USMLE, or LOR's, might help me tell those who are well trained from those who are not, they don't. Most of the allopathic US Medical schools generate high quality students. International and some DO schools, not so much. That's why it matters.
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The point here is that you can't simply put a label on a doctor because of the school he/she graduated from. There are good IMGs and bad IMGs, just like there are good AMGs and bad AMGs. Just because a doctor is an IMG doesn't automatically make him less qualified or less skilled. The sad truth is that as an IMG, even if you're much more qualified than an AMG, you'd still be considered inferior just because you went to medical school outside the US.
 
wagy27 said:
These US-IMG's for whatever it's for worth, couldn't get into or chose not to go to an AMG school and should suffer the consequences of that. When your classes are board prep, and you take months to study for boards, that's not apple to apple comparison of board scores.
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oh i'm suffering the consequences all right.... of listening to you:barf:

sounds like somebody is harboring some resentment.

gag me. the sense of entitlement by some people... you're a broken record man. you'll take this fight to every forum eventually all for naught.
 
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I agree with APD.
The problem isn't necessarily any problem with the students down there (although there are some who probably shouldn't be in med school, a lot of those probably flunk out before getting to the residency-application point). The problem is with some of the schools down there; it just takes tremendous resources to properly educate a medical student. There needs to be some 1-on-1 teaching in an appropriate hospital setting. There needs to be a curriculum that is not haphazard, that is well set up. There needs to be competent instructors who are up on the latest research/info from their fields. I could go on and on, but it's just hard to understand and appreciate if you're a premed student.

Also, in truth some of the Caribbean schools (and some DO schools, historially, though not as much so now) take students who could not make the cut at US schools, academically. Some of those schools will take just about anyone, and then they don't do much to educate them. The people, if motivated and reasonably smart, can memorize or learn enough stuff to pass the US medical licensing exam that will allow them to apply for a US residency. However, some of them didn't get taught how to properly approach thinking about a sick patient, and/or how to examine a patient, and how to work in a US hospital effectively. You can't just learn to be a doctor from reading a book (or books).

Yes, some of it is probably just "name brand bias" from program directors, but there are just a lot of reasons why they don't prefer Caribbean grads. That doesn't mean there aren't a lot of individual good Caribbean students or a couple schools down there that are probably pretty good, but there are a lot of crappy ones. All you have to do is to do a Google search to find that out.

Also, historically (and I guess maybe presently too?) there have been students who went to the Caribbean and graduated after being kicked out of US schools for some sort of misbehavior like cheating, etc. Also there may be people who had some sort of criminal conviction, etc. I think these people are probably pretty rare, but some med school faculty members are leery of stuff like this.
 
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