Working/Fellowships in foreign countries?

[bongobingo]

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I understand that it is very difficult for american doctors to work in europe and vice versa. Obviously you have all those cultural issues and residency qualifications. But it is easy to take medical electives as a student. For example in 4th year it does not seem to matter if you do a 4week away elective in USA or anywhere else.
But let's say you finished all your training and are now an attending in the US. And now suddenly you want to go for 4weeks or 4months to a different country like Scotland. Would it then be realistic to get some kind of fellowship? Say you get paid modestly (like all residents/fellows) but you get clinical responsibilities and learn from their attendings? For example if you are board certified in IM and work as a hospitalist in USA, could you get training as an endocrinologist or in some other vaguely related subspecalty in another country?
How about if you want to work on a research project in a country where you dont even speak their language- like Sweden. Let's say you don't have much of a research background (you are just a community physician in usa having a midlife crisis), would it be realistic to get some "research fellowship" for 1year so you could live in that foreign country and at the same time do something pertinent to your specialty?

 

[TexasPhysician]

Anything is possible but I see little use in what you are doing. A clinical fellowship in Scotland doesn't allow you to practice that fellowship in the USA. I also don't see why anyone would hire a person that doesn't speak the language. If you were a researcher at Harvard, would you hire someone to help that only spoke Ukranian? How would you discuss findings? Its not like researchers have an extra $50000 lying around to pay for a translator.

If you really want to live in another country, do a residency in radiology. Then find a job doing teleradiology for some hospital while you sit on the beach in Australia, Sweden, or wherever.

 

[BigRedBeta]

The US/Canada are the oddballs in medical education compared to the rest of the world. The foundations/registrar system of specialization is extremely different than the residency/fellowship system, and the methods of the matching systems are very different.

However, just like in the US, graduate medical education spots don't just open up, they are competitive to get in to, and they are awarded with the implied completion of training - not just a couple months worth of work.

In other words, this notion is highly impractical and would be difficult to see through.

I guess what I really don't understand out of your question is why, if you were a practicing physician in the US who wished to go to Scotland or wherever, you'd go there to WORK(?). As a 4th year med student I went to Australia (it was awesome) for a cardiology elective, but that's only because that was the requirement for me to get credit towards graduation. If I had had more vacation time available, believe me, it would have been better for me to go unaffiliated and with no commitments. I would have gotten to see more of the country for sure (rather than spending 5 mornings a week on incredibly inefficient inpatient rounds), and if I had wanted to learn more about cardiology, I would have learned infinitely more by staying at my home institution and doing a rotation there.

 

[bongobingo]

Thank you all! This information has straightened me out. I don't think I will be pursuing any post-graduate(though I still have a long time to go before I graduate) work in a foreign system.