Touro, NY -Middletown vs BGU-MSIH, Israel

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NJMusicMan

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Touro, NY Middletown
Pros
  • Close to where I live now (NYC). My wife works and lives in NYC.
  • Flipped classroom curriculum which is attractive for my learning style.
  • Very modern facilities with plastination, 3D modeling, and anatomy labs.
  • Osteopathic American medical school.
  • Excellent 1st time pass rates and good decent allopathic residency placements in all specialties. Many residency locations are unknown to me in smaller hospitals.

Cons
  • Not interested in OMM on cursory look.
  • Very expensive. Total COA of ~90k per year.
  • Some doctors, who happen to be ENT surgeons whom I work for, say a DO degree hampers my career. This is controversial and I am aware of the debate.
  • Very boring environment.
  • Rotations seem to be somewhat disorganized and take place in smaller hospitals far away. Limited electives.
  • Larger class sizes ~120
  • Very limited research opportunities.


Ben Gurion University - MSIH
Pros
  • Allopathic American curriculum in English for USMLE preparation.
  • International health curriculum which I am very interested in. Hebrew language curriculum which I am also interested in as my wife is Israeli and I do not know the language.
  • Small class sizes ~40
  • Electives take place at NY Presbyterian-Columbia. The administration for MSIH is housed at Columbia and seems very organized and proactive.
  • Excellent 1st time pass rate and excellent residency placements including radiology, surgery, anesthesiology, OB/GYN, pediatrics, neuro, IM, EM, and family practice in major hospitals.
  • Very affordable total COA ~60. They offered me a scholarship.
  • School is in a major hospital in Israel that is attached to a major research university. Lots of opportunities for research.

Cons
  • Technically considered IMG. Albeit Israel has an excellent reputation. I currently work in the ER and many physicians that I scribe for, who are DO or went to SGU, are against leaving country and are very pro DO.
  • My wife is Israeli but would prefer to stay in NYC. However she recently has voiced support for attending school in Israel.

Summary: I am confident I would thrive at either school. My biggest uncertainty is the effect of DO or IMG-Israel would have on my residency options. Which would open/close more doors? I have found no data that suggests Israel would hamper my residency search. My acceptance to Touro happened yesterday and I had pretty much started planning on attending BGU.

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Given the successful matches at BGU I think I would go ahead and choose that. Also it's much cheaper, and your wife is Israeli, and you could go to school in Israel, which is pretty cool. If you see yourself being happy there then I would choose it.
 
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Given the successful matches at BGU I think I would go ahead and choose that. Also it's much cheaper, and your wife is Israeli, and you could go to school in Israel, which is pretty cool. If you see yourself being happy there then I would choose it.

Thanks for reply. Yes I have no hesitation about being in Israel for 3 years. My only concern is ability to match. But data is strongly in favor of a good match likelihood.
 
Thanks for reply. Yes I have no hesitation about being in Israel for 3 years. My only concern is ability to match. But data is strongly in favor of a good match likelihood.

One caveat – make sure that they have a good match rate. Inquire about how many student start as M1 and make it until M4 and match. The Caribbean schools like to boast an inflated match rate because they only let people take step 1 who pass their own internal exam first, something like 50% will dropout by the end of M4 and only 50% of those will match. I looked at their match list for 2015 and they had 27 people match, I don't know why it isn't 40 so that will be a question that you should ask them. Good luck and report back here or send me a private message, I am curious to know what you find out and which school you end up choosing!
 
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One caveat – make sure that they have a good match rate. Inquire about how many student start as M1 and make it until M4 and match. The Caribbean schools like to boast an inflated match rate because they only let people take step 1 who pass their own internal exam first, something like 50% will dropout by the end of M4 and only 50% of those will match. I looked at their match list for 2015 and they had 27 people match, I don't know why it isn't 40 so that will be a question that you should ask them. Good luck and report back here or send me a private message, I am curious to know what you find out and which school you end up choosing!
Looks like they had a smaller class in 2015. Only 1 person did not match according to administration. They do not have a history of people dropping out as well.
 
I am a skeptic. I would confirm the only 1 non match per administration. They may be misleading you. In different ways. They may define matching as matching in Israel for example. .....


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I think it's an apple vs an orange. I think DO route downside is mostly risk if you want to be non primary care as opposed to Israel risk might be not being able to return to US. with upside being perception of MD versus perception of DO plus chances for non primary care.


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I decided to attend BGU as I decided the intangibles, curriculum, and cost trumped that of Touro. Bottom line is both choices were good choices for me and I am happy to have made one from my gut. Good luck to everyone else!
 
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I decided to attend BGU as I decided the intangibles, curriculum, and cost trumped that of Touro. Bottom line is both choices were good choices for me and I am happy to have made one from my gut. Good luck to everyone else!
Congrats! I think you made the right choice.
 
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I decided to attend BGU as I decided the intangibles, curriculum, and cost trumped that of Touro. Bottom line is both choices were good choices for me and I am happy to have made one from my gut. Good luck to everyone else!
In a similar situation: will your wife be moving with you?
 
She will be in NYC from September to May and then move to join me in Israel in 06/2018. It will be difficult but maybe I can focus better for my first year!
 
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