tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239Wed, 20 Aug 2008 01:30:41 +0000http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/noreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)Blogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-1063009103038761451Sun, 20 Jul 2008 20:13:00 +00002008-07-20T15:11:15.270-07:00USMLE Relax ! Not happening too soon - but not too far ahead in the future either - we are talking more like after 2011/2012. The combining of USMLE steps 1 and 2 CK will happen parallel to the change towards an integrated medical/clinical education model - i.e. clinical integration right from the start of medical school as opposed to the current method of covering basic medical sciences in the early http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/07/usmle-steps-1-2-ck-may-be-combined-soon.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-4133098660043815103Tue, 22 Apr 2008 22:53:00 +00002008-04-22T16:06:48.590-07:00On a case article published on the American Medical Association Journal of Ethics, Dr. Peter Bundred writes a very interesting commentary about the ethical concerns that prevailed in Dr. Wilson's decision to hire an IMG from Ghana to fill her Family Medicine residency programs, after positions were unfilled in the Match. What's carries a higher moral weight ? - The program directors role & dutyhttp://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/04/prog-directors-ethical-img-hiring.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-1274158178808752251Sun, 20 Apr 2008 18:47:00 +00002008-04-20T12:12:45.927-07:00Australia Like the US has H1b visas for employers to hire temporary skilled foreign workers, the "457 visa" allows employers to hire temporary skilled foreign workers in Australia. This news report talks about income figures released by the Australian Medical Association "The Australian show the average salary of general medical practitioners on 457 visas was $82,100 in 2006-07, an "extremely low" http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/04/below-market-pays-for-temp-imgs-in.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-3729280026820403410Thu, 20 Mar 2008 02:09:00 +00002008-03-19T20:20:33.058-07:00And the lawsuit was not against ECFMG - rather against the Medical school for allegedly not verifying the documents , thus delaying ECFMG certification for the complainant, Dr. Atif Anwar. According to this news story: "The petitioner said that he had passed USMLE Step-I in 2006 and had applied for USMLE Step-II, but the principal was not ready to verify the documents" I am mentioned this http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/03/img-files-lawsuit-on-ecfmg-document.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-4249525918846180399Tue, 19 Feb 2008 22:56:00 +00002008-02-20T15:07:13.064-08:00USA ALERT: The a new rule to reverse the foolish rule has been signed by the governor 5 days ago - it will only be a matter of few weeks / months until immigrants start getting Drivers Licenses Issued too. Thanks to alert readers to point that out to me ! Read Reversal News here So read the post below as an archive instead ;-) " Some laws are exasperating, some ridiculous - while some qualify http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/02/no-drivers-licenses-for-new-imgs-in.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-3635044056691527022Tue, 19 Feb 2008 06:07:00 +00002008-02-19T00:09:56.991-08:00United Kingdom After United Kingdom instituted a new medical education system in 2005, mismanagement resulted in two graduating batches of medical students applying for one year of post-graduate house officer training positions resulting in a big excess of applicants to positions ratio. For any country is natural to first provide training opportunities for its own candidates than outside nationals and that's http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/02/uk-bans-imgs-from-post-graduate.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-6568012783531373523Sat, 16 Feb 2008 02:29:00 +00002008-02-15T19:33:03.849-08:00CanadaThis post is more of a debate opener and I hope knowledgeable people will post their inputs in helping us build this. Inspired more by a particularly belligerent pro-Canadian IMG on my USMLE - Residency Group on Facebook, I might be wrong on same places since I admit, I am still learning the details of the Canadian Residency System for IMGs. To start with, here are some figures that we can puthttp://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/02/canada-vs-american-residency-chances.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-689821497902404155Sun, 13 Jan 2008 02:34:00 +00002008-01-12T19:07:19.164-08:00ChinaSince the year 2004, there has been a rising flood of foreign students seeking medical school admissions in China for the MBBS Degree (Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery). Indian students seem to be making a bulk of these. A a couple of inquiring emails to me from students who had USMLE intentions after completing MBBS in China, made me lookup the scenario. Not all Medical schools in http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/01/list-of-chinese-medical-universities.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-3071240011686012877Sun, 06 Jan 2008 01:49:00 +00002008-01-06T03:46:58.272-08:00ScamSomething amusing to share with readers at USMLEtoMD.com :-) The Christiana Care Health System residency program in General Surgery is located in Newark, Delaware. I happened to read a story on how the program 'demoted' one of its general surgery residents - Dr. Ahmad Bali, back to the second year from the third year. Dr. Bali sued the program and the Delaware court ordered that he be promoted http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2008/01/courts-gift-year-of-residency.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-7460959245855610991Mon, 31 Dec 2007 21:55:00 +00002007-12-31T14:05:34.910-08:00It's funny for me to receive an email message from myself that I never sent! Unless "Digitaldoc" has finally decided to shake his existence off my physical being and take over a whole new life of his own ---- Oooooh spoooooooky, especially after I saw a horror movie last night. I have noticed that someone may be using some sorta email-id masker to send messages about my post on FMG America and http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/12/have-you-recently-been-spammed-by.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-1356717599761722050Wed, 12 Dec 2007 08:44:00 +00002007-12-13T17:39:56.108-08:00 And the point of this useless post is to simply giggle at the paradox and the irony of it - as the only guy who maintains and writes on this site, I occasionally lose my bearings ;-). Google Trends is an interesting tool - it analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the term and also displays the top cities, regions, and languages in which http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/12/usmle-searched-more-outside-america.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-5094192095999717393Wed, 05 Dec 2007 01:09:00 +00002007-12-04T18:27:45.486-08:00Hundreds of IMGs that come to the USA hoping for a residency, do so by first entering the United States for Graduate program in Public Health - Masters in Public Health (MPH) to be more specific. And I have had scores of emails asking about career options in MPH , in case residency dreams do not work. Here are somethings I would like to point out: 1. The first usual concern = Salary ! Speakinghttp://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/12/careers-in-public-health-for-imgs-in.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-8002198104947623907Fri, 30 Nov 2007 19:50:00 +00002007-11-30T15:59:52.901-08:00 I sincerely hope this drives the point home to people involved in posting those e-book links and free Kaplan DVD download links, rapid-share links to copyrighted books and materials on Facebook, Orkut, Myspace and even Yahoo-Google Groups and various forums. On Yahoo groups, you are bound to come across people based out of the United Sates trying to sell you Kaplan Notes and DVD Materials for http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/11/kaplan-sues-usmlepro-for-usmle-test.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-2442821966484072031Wed, 14 Nov 2007 08:21:00 +00002007-12-12T02:21:47.804-08:00ScamFor quite sometime now, I have been receiving regular updates from a group of IMGs who have had bitter experiences with FMGamerica - a firm that supposedly places IMGs in clinical externships and also helps them with residency placements for a big sum of money. Once before in the past, I had already posted a warning-kinda post about FMGamerica and the complaint posted on BBB. That was obviously http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/11/fmgamerica-possible-fraud.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-7812126995549480849Sat, 03 Nov 2007 19:54:00 +00002007-11-03T14:47:18.237-07:00ScamAs most of you already know - To become a licensed Nephrologist in the USA, after completing medical school and taking the USMLEs, one must finish a 3-year residency in Internal Medicine and then complete a 3-year fellowship in Nephrology. So how do you complete a Medical school in 2005 and be a Nephrologist in the USA by 2007 ? Check out this telephonic Interview script with "Dr. Yemi http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/11/medical-school-in-2005-us-nephrologist.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-1834001476598880197Thu, 25 Oct 2007 08:27:00 +00002007-10-25T01:44:58.339-07:00Dr. Ravi Godse, who completed medical school in India and now a practicing physician in the US, came to the United States in 1995 to start his residency at the St. Francis Medical Center in Lawrenceville. He is making a bit of news on the movie circuit after the release of his "Dr. Ravi and Mr. Hyde" DVD - shall we call this a 'moonlighting' of a different kind eh ? ;-) He runs his own http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/10/img-physician-releases-own-movie-in-us.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-2455050585644592595Wed, 10 Oct 2007 22:06:00 +00002007-10-10T15:31:57.078-07:00CanadaThis was one of the inferences drawn by a study conducted by Montreal's McGill University and at Montreal General Hospital, Canada. International medical graduates were more likely to prescribe antibiotics for viral upper respiratory infections, which do not respond to antibiotics. IMG is a relative term, and the paper found that this applied more to Non-US and Non-British IMGs in Canada The http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/10/imgs-more-likely-to-prescribe.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-1609571080006871358Mon, 08 Oct 2007 16:11:00 +00002008-04-01T14:00:55.262-07:00PhilippinesUSA Teri Hatcher's character on "Desperate Housewives", Susan, after being shocked at a physician's diagnosis of Menopause says - "OK, before we go any further, can I check these diplomas? Just to make sure they aren't, like, from some med school in the Philippines ?" This was in pretty bad taste, you would agree. Obviously drew a lot of angry phone calls and an apology from the ABC studios. As http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/10/desperate-housewives-insults-filipino.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-4682345649796286043Sun, 30 Sep 2007 00:06:00 +00002007-09-30T03:01:34.958-07:00SingaporeOK they don't use the term "IMGs" - they rather say "Foreign-trained Medical doctors". While Singapore is officially the best place on earth to do business, the country is dealing with a doctor-shortage crisis. they are training their attraction-guns on foreign trained docs and have been slowing opening up entry pathways. With good salaries (that I shall cover soon on my Physician salaries bloghttp://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/09/how-can-imgs-practice-medicine-in.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6560646275716039239.post-6917544655885780864Thu, 27 Sep 2007 01:34:00 +00002007-09-26T18:51:33.550-07:00 It's only apt that I begin this blog with this post. Until 2005 (could be 2006), both terms - "Foreign Medical Graduate" and "International Medical Graduate" were in existence in the US Medical system. As per the Old definitions: - The term "Foreign Medical Graduate" meant a non-US Citizen who graduated from of a non-US Medical school while - An "International Medical Graduate" meant a http://www.usmletomd.com/imgdigest/2007/09/how-does-usa-define-international.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Digitaldoc, MD)