string you along, be the Grinch that stole Chanukah make you stay for Does SGU give the opportunity of rotation in US for all the students or just few top students? The guy didnt even know simple generic names for Zyrtec or such a thing as pericarditis. AUA should have built new library instead. Plus, its an unpleasant place with mosquitoes, waterbugs, pollution from the refineries, undrinkable water and an oppressive hot, humid climate. Perhaps that is true for some, but for many the fact that they realize that a school has just trashed their dreams or making it extremely difficult for them to attain it, is heartbreaking. actually several states have BS to MD programs. I do not think that US Medical Schools are putting out the greatest doctors, especially after having handled medical malpractice lawsuits for the last 20 years and knowing that medical negligence is now the 3rd leading cause of death in the United States. We have a great psych department for those who suffer of anxiety, depression or are facing a difficult time. Saba is know to fail people. Thanks Tori. I have been paying my own way since I was 14. I am a class 12 student from India and it has been my dream to become a surgeon in the US. All rights reserved. Also, you can ask the faculty to hook you up with a few ex-students who have matched (this is what I did) and honestly it was their advice I let sink in my head more than the negatives. what school are you going to? Thats unbelievable. This school forces ALL international students (who started from premed, straight out of high school) do 6-7 extra months of classes, where in this time they will earn a BACHELORS DEGREE! Its a crapshoot whether you will be vaguely steered in the right direction by the school itself. I have done my research on Carrib med schools and I do not think I would have an issue with the island life as my parents are from the carribean and I would love to hear what you have to say about class size esp anatomy classes, and professor relationships and well preparation for USMLE Step 1 program and clinical rotations. you were given the option to give it a second try, but you had to start all the way from semester one. one building three stores not large enough to fit all med1s but something to brag about in their brochures I guess. People really turn the Caribbean medical school discussion into something bigger than it really it. I wouldnt want a physician who couldnt maintain a C to work on me or anyone on my family. Everything I have found/researched looks promising. I remember an attending once told me that he preferred Caribbean students because he knows how hard we had to work to get to where we are now so that was nice to hear! I thought THAT was Bad! Hi the problem is it can be hard to know the full truth if one didnt do proper research on their school or never met an alumni. There are people who want to be a doctor for the sake of becoming a doctor, and also some who need an MD for research jobs, medicolegal, Med School Professors, ETC.. I should have worked as a scribe, shadowed, and did more science work. Please I know you want to atleast sit back and let your MD work for you a little bit and reap rewards of your labor rightfully so.. Dont forget the reason that help you stick to it. In 2016, she was accepted to a residency program in family medicine at a hospital in Hendersonville, North Carolina. I need to be honest and say that Ive had a really hard time at SJSM. If they miss even a single day, they get their wages docked. They discriminate between students. the first 2 years of medical school at IUHS is online? Couple that with fewer subject requirements (most U.S. schools also ask for physics and calculus) and an unspecified MCAT score (and not even a mandatory MCAT in the case of international students), and its safe to say its definitely not that hard to get into. (Major Pros & Cons), s AUC A Good Medical School? Pill mills abound, Ive even These schools want high quality doctors and have reputations to uphold. My advice, like the author of the article, is to do something else for a bit. With everything else completed, they did me every disservice to prevent me from taking my exam this offered no benefit. That is hard. So why come here? You will always be surrounded by many students who arent 100% dedicated and you just need to make sure you separate yourself and focus on studying as much as you can, even if all your friends are all hanging out together. Not having to complete an undergraduate degree to apply, certainly makes Saba open to more applicants. Sounds like you went to a school similar Avalon University School of Medicine in Curaao. SGU pushes students to maintain above an 80%, because that correlates with ~220 >> the bare minimum that IMGs from SGU should get if they want to match into a non-competitive residency. Couldnt they alert me $200k sooner if they thought I needed to step up my game rather than giving me As? It is sad to see friends that didnt make it, but most of the ones that I know failed because they held onto a negative attitude, expected others to do the work for them, got into substance abuse and night life, or simply just didnt want it bad enough to sacrifice everything for this dream. in Human Biology. Many of us miss our families; we missed family celebrations and parties at our best friends house. Hi, I would like to get in contact with you just to speak to you and ask you a couple of questions about attending medical school in the Caribbean, would that be possible by any change? Please what caribbean med school do you attend? Sgu curriculum built that way. The attrition is a very sad reality. If Psychological services are needed, they are also available for free. I attended a Caribbean medical school in a Spanish speaking Island. If you They for a long time had federal loans and eventually lost them due to low performance on USMLEs. The university receives application from the students at any time of the year, a student can plan in advance to inquire about the status of the classes and Med School program for its application, the Saba University of Medicine Acceptance Rate for each class is approximately 90 students in each. If you have a legitimate concern about how the school does business, they will lie to you or ignore you. Hi Dr. Wible, Everyone has different experiences about their transition at Caribbean medical schools. I wish I could recommend SJSM to other med school hopefuls. Much of what he wrote resonated with me, and while reading it, was thinking, yep, uh huh, saw that, experienced that. Can I ask what Post-bacc program you did? I am writing to you to share my own perspective of Caribbean medical schools, as I am a student of Ross University and currently in my 4th year. 4. I know that a lot of great doctors come from my school. Heart-wrenching photo of doctor crying goes viral. For the past several years Saba University students have achieved a 99% first-time pass rate on USMLE Step , this rate was a perfect 100%. Your generalization based upon a few Caribbean graduates is rather harsh and ill informed. Does anyone see this as a call for help ? At AUA, ROSS, AUC, SGU, etc. will they help pay for the class or semester you need to retake or do you have to find your own funding or take out private loans? The majority of Amazing. Many schools in the caribbean give just about anyone a chance but it is up to them to sink or swim. ; Participants can check in at the Broadway entrance of Lerner Hall upon arrival. My son studys 15 yo 17 hour days. Equinox Capital, a private-equity firm based in Greenwich, Connecticut, bought the Saba school and MUA for $36 million in 2007. I hope he/she has a plan B well underway in some allied, or other, field. I am taking the time to write this because Caribbean schools are not what people think they are, or at least my school is not what everyone says about Caribbean schools. it would be of tremendous help as this is something ive wanted to do my whole life. Hi Dr. Wible. It is embarrassing, Bass said, that Cuba educates our students for free.. I wish I had known what I was in for before starting med school. there are also other factors that make a student decide on their school like the cost of tution. When they see the quality of tutelage and mix that with the stress and workload, the second round of students drop out by midterms. Yet the goal to expland and expedite all INTO ONTO THE USA neurtralizationat warp speed PS curing COVI the internationalist were permitted to take their entrance exams into Med Schoolon their own. Be one of those few students that stay at home with their head in the books while others go out. I told them I never got federal loans. I heard that last semester, the first time pass rate for the COMP was 20%. Dont be too hard on yourself because in the end life is what you make it. Determination is bs. Professors who barely know students unless you make yourself known. Talk about conflict of interest.. the largest provider of family/internal medicine docs to the USA with no regulatory oversight also controls the testing centers that administers the exams that allow students to match depending on those scores This is beyond me..and have lost hope in the healthcare system; and from the quality of students I have seen at this school I fear for the future of America and predict medical errors, malpractice litigation, and the regression of society as a whole.. Oh this is definitely SGU. Saba University School of Medicine, Caribbean Netherlands Courses: Gross Anatomy & Embryology, Immunology & Microbiology, Genetics, Metabolism & Nutrition, Neuroscience & Neuroanatomy, Systems & Diseases. Next they should assess how fast do they want to go. Eat healthy, dont overthink about that people did to you if it isnt something that physically hurt you; study and focus. Although the school was lacking in creature comfortsthe students slept in bunk beds; the hot water and electricity were unreliable; there was little access to the Internet or the phonePhillip powered through. Eventually the SGA got ahold of the provost and wrote to him about what was going on. I know of a class that started off semester 1 with 45 students. THIS DEGREE IS RECOGNIZED NOWHERE! I was a hardworking student with an upwards trajectory grades-wise. The government office gave us a Bad time with our student visas, to the point where we had to go in and out of the country with tourist passes during our rotation years. I mean Im currently living my dream. Its also how your brain is going to force you to think, but if you end up on the island, learn not to dwell on too many thoughts, express them, write them, whatever you do with them, just study. I want to fill you in on what really goes on behind the scenes at my medical school and maybe you can help inform other students about what happens here before they make a huge mistake. You are going to meet people that you dont agree with and people that you will love on the islands. God bless you! However, once it was time to enter Med 5 (the final semester), administration then told these students that they arent allowed to go into MD 5 without first completing the bachelors program that they decided to skip initially. Low attrition rates, and good performance on Step and in Rotations is why SGU has the ability to match so much better than any other Caribbean school. What about all the heartaches that they cause every year to thousands of applicants. Or if you know anyone who attended tat school. The school backed down and reinstated the old grading scheme for the classes. In terms of professionalism and educational quality, it doesnt seem all that different from any other med school either. I am also SGU student and this is very inaccurate and misleading. Did clinicals in NYCgot accepted to a University Hospital IM residency in the South and now Im applying for fellowship in a competitive field currently with what one would say are a lot of interviews. I am from Nigeria and after high school, I moved to the United States for undergrad. I will use all i have learned and what i will learn and find my niche and my place in the system. Whether or not the system of selection is fair or not, those who will not let their dream dye, do consider attending a Caribbean med-school a serious option. There are students in the US dropping out of medical school, same happens in the Caribbean. If you graduated from such a school, talking badly about it is not going to do any favors for your reputation as a doctor. What medical school are you attending? What helps is me laughing at my life in the Caribbean, in the morning thinking I am about to take a shower, only to be waiting for water that is coming out slowly and slowly determined to get clean, until I learned to be smarter and bought a bucket to store water and made friends with a girl at a house with water that doesnt run out, and she could come to my place for I had a generator. Thank you. That is really rally hard program and they give admission to those student who has very high MCAT. But these are risk many motivated students like my self are willing to take in order to practice such a humble and noble profession. Dr. Stewart hi. Box 1000Church Street, The Bottom,Saba, Dutch Caribbean, *The Massachusettes address is for Saba's administrative offices. I enrolled in 2 semesters of physics and passed with an A and a B+. In Canada, where access to medical schools and residencies thereafter is extremely competitive, Saba has earned a strong reputation through large numbers of placements in the Canadian Residency Matching System, or CaRMS. A bachelors degree in 6 months?? For those of you interested in studying medicine in the Caribbean, there are options apart from the for-profit off shore medical schools. Practice what you preach, isnt that how the common saying go? That program call medical master program . As I and many other students said it above, there are pros and cons coming here but at the end we have to be thankful that Caribbean schools are giving us a one-time opportunity to become physicians. First off. Provisional CAAM-HP accreditation I had a better experience at Avalon University School of Medicine environment with smaller classes and clinical availabilities. Any raising of ones voice to any injustice us foreign students faced was punished one way or another. In the US and some countries they filter the applicants prior to entry. Spot on! Something that makes Saba one of the more attractive options out of all the Caribbean med schools is its high residency match rate at 94%. The farthest apartments I heard from students who live off campus are about 15 min distance in car from the school. Scholarships of up to $110K for students of the U.S and up to $120K for Canadian Students. or foist horseshit on us such as: Winter I am fairly sure that no human ever read any of my application. I disagree with you through and through. Simple as that. Caribbean school should be your last resort and when youve decided its your last resort, make sure you compare the top 3 and see which suits you best (St. George, Ross, AUC). Since I am unable to get into a US medical school, I am applying to SGU. Was accepted into residencies but they couldnt ratify that because of not having Part II of the Boards. That makes them one of the best Caribbean medical schools out there! (5) Students who cannot self study will fail? Dahn. AUA is one of the big fours and this is how AUA works. Looking at other people is just a killer. 1. So what did the school decide to do, well they decided that they would allow students in semester 1 to move on to the next semester as long as they got a grade higher than 35% overall, but here is the catch, at the end of the second semester you had to get an overall grade of 70% in order to move on to semester 3. cramped, relatively pricey, lacking amenities, laundry cooking etc.. but if you got money you drop the clothes off to a laundromat and eat out at small cafeterias. I registered my car the legal way and had it confiscated at one point-MUCH more aggravation than those that registered as tourists, scraped off the stickers in Brownsville and got new ones. Today, sixty-four million Americans live in areas where there is only one primary-care physician for every three thousand people. 2) The island is unreasonably difficult to live on. Ultimately, you need to be the kind of person that could teach your self medicine from home, as if it were an online program. Whatever is the reason, its better for you to ask and do your research about medical schools. When picking your medical school, or your job and location; examine yourself. If you arent in SJSM I advise to get out. AUC is getting approved by GMC within the next 4 months fyi. You see that with relationships, after many years marriages that no-one ever thought will fail, fail. [4] Im just being honest with you, not meant to be mean, just honest. So did you decide to join SGU?? The problem is that everyone who makes it that far is not necessarily dedicated to being the best they can be at what they do, and that is the point where we get bad Doctors, not because the schools are terrible, but because the students themselves are many times not highly motivated to be the best. Usually I never comment on blogs but your article is so convincing that I cant stop myself from saying something and giving my best review about it. You cannot rely on the school to prepare you for the USMLE. Thus these Schools must force these excessive students ( much like the over-booked flights) thru one means or the other resulting in a attrition rates as high as 40%. Saba University School of Medicine was founded in 1992 with a bold mission: to establish an international alternative to U.S. and Canadian medical schools that would not only provide an excellent medical education and expansive career opportunities but also maintain an affordable tuition. Saba medical school has the advantage of having a very high, Return from Saba Medical School to Caribbean Medical Schools. Most schools will have a facebook group so if youre looking to get into one, join those groups and ask questions. I have met other students who also got scholarships from this school, and their scholarships are of about $100K. 40k-100k scholarship (discount) I assume SGU. All of the debt I have incurred. Residency is a whole nother set of problems but finishing med school at one or another school is not. I have not started medical school yet in the Caribbean, but I expect it is like anything else: if you work hard you can become a competent physician. I have made lifelong friends also. Do not rely on guidelines to remain as they are. I read this with great interest as a specialist trained in Quebec 35 years ago. 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