SGU rotations

[cabrillo]

I heard that at SGU students ony spend 20 months in the island. is this true? I am from california. can I do my rotations in cali? or do I have to go somewhere else??? please help!

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I heard that at SGU students ony spend 20 months in the island. is this true? I am from california. can I do my rotations in cali? or do I have to go somewhere else??? please help!

SGU still has clinical rotation spots available (I believe?) at Kern Medical Center in Bakersfield, but from what I understand these are still fairly competitive and hard to get.

The reputable Caribbean schools all offer clinical rotations at U.S. teaching hospitals, and therefore spend only the pre-clinical sciences in the islands. SGU requires students to move to St. Vincent's for their introduction to clinical medicine semester. So, it's a little bit of a pain to have to switch islands. Ross and AUA (in Antigua) spend the shortest amount of calendar time in the islands at 16 months.

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[RAD11]

For both SGU and Ross:

Can you choose your rotation sites? Does the school assign it based on state of residency or is it totally random?

 

[Dukes]

For both SGU and Ross:

Can you choose your rotation sites? Does the school assign it based on state of residency or is it totally random?

At sgu, what happens is that during your last term of 2nd year you give them your top 3 choices and a paragraph or two explaining why you want to be at those places. Most students get one of the top 3 but some are put in random spots. Nobody seems to know how exactly they go about deciding but it works out for the majority of students.

 

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At Ross, you basically tell them you whether you want to be in Chicago or New York. Depending on your preference, they will assign your rotations. You have to apply for Kern in California and it is pretty hard to get. Also, Pediatrics and Surgery core rotations are hard to come by as well. Therefore, you may have to fill up your schedule with electives until a spot opens up. Occassionally, students are forced to take a surgery rotation in Ohio or Massachusetts to fit their schedule. Not really a big deal except that it becomes hard to get out of a lease and/or forces you to pay double rent for those 12 weeks.

Just one of the hassles of going this route, but my schedule actually worked out pretty neatly for me and I didn't have any gaps longer than two weeks, some of which were planned anyway. And, I still finished early.

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[cabrillo]

At Ross, you basically tell them you whether you want to be in Chicago or New York. Depending on your preference, they will assign your rotations. You have to apply for Kern in California and it is pretty hard to get. Also, Pediatrics and Surgery core rotations are hard to come by as well. Therefore, you may have to fill up your schedule with electives until a spot opens up. Occassionally, students are forced to take a surgery rotation in Ohio or Massachusetts to fit their schedule. Not really a big deal except that it becomes hard to get out of a lease and/or forces you to pay double rent for those 12 weeks.

Just one of the hassles of going this route, but my schedule actually worked out pretty neatly for me and I didn't have any gaps longer than two weeks, some of which were planned anyway. And, I still finished early.

-Skip

first of all thank you for all the valuable info. This is my situation; I am married living in california and I am deciding what could be a good medical school for me to go and not have to travel so much. UAG offers me everything in Guadalajara for the first 4 years but is longer than the caribean specifically Ross and SGU which I am planning to apply to. my questions are:
how often do you have to travel to different states to do you rotations or electives?
isnt this very expensive?
is this program a better than what UAG offers in terms of stability and money?
thanks again for all the input

 

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UAG offers me everything in Guadalajara for the first 4 years but is longer than the caribean specifically Ross and SGU which I am planning to apply to.

Again, I'd strongly reconsider UAG. Just my $0.02.

my questions are:
how often do you have to travel to different states to do you rotations or electives?

Well, remember that I chose to come to New York. In the case of New York students, to be honest, I think Ross (if we're talking only about Ross, which I assume we are) needs to keep students in those rotations they've set-up in other states in order for the hospital to justify the contract. While I don't think they'd ever come out and explicitly admit it, they tend to create situations where a student may feel "forced" to go to Cape Cod or Ohio in order to get done on time. I think this is one of the downsides of Ross.

Personally, I was quite clear that I did not want to leave New York or be forced to break my lease. So, I didn't have to. As a result, though, I was forced to take a core surgery rotation that I did not want.

Overall, I get the general impression, although many of their students complain as well, that SGU has a more stable and better organized clinical clerkship program.

isnt this very expensive?

Yes, it can be. A lot of students try to find temporary housing through Craigslist or the like. Not a good situation if you are married. Another option would be to go to Chicago, which will provide you much more stability and where you won't have to move, but where (I believe) the clinical rotations are not as good.

is this program a better than what UAG offers in terms of stability and money?

Your primary worry should not be about stability and money if you go this route. It should be about what program is going to give you the best chance to most quickly get into the residency you want when you finish. Some of the concerns you express are why, in part, going this route is not for everyone (as they find out after investing a lot of time and money) and at least partly helps to explain the high attrition rate at these schools. It can indeed be very stressful.

But, if you go to UAG (or any other Mexican school), you will have to do a "fifth-pathway" year, a complete waste of time IMHO. Using Anesthesiology (my field) as an example, this year 58 U.S. IMGs (from Carib and other schools) matched into programs whereas only one "fifth-pathway" graduate did. I'm sure a lot more than "one" medical grad coming out of Mexico last year wanted anesthesiology (and, yes, fifth-pathway's are a separate type of U.S. IMG and are not lumped together with the other U.S. IMGs).

thanks again for all the input

No problem. Just my opinion, though. You have to decide what's right for you and your family.

Good luck with your decision.

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