Foreign doctors should face tougher exams, study says Here's a BBC story that could well relate to what's happening here in the USA. As we lose more home-bred doctors due to the massive adverse changes in our health-care system, more foreign doctors will take their place. Do we have tough enough tests for them? Read the full story @ http://www.bbc.com/news/health-27076216 And, it links to this story @ http://www.bbc.com/news/health-27076137
I am a retired M.D./ G.P. and was never happy with FMG's (foreign medical graduates). Sometimes they can, really, really be excellent. Mostly in physical diagnosis relying less on "images". Problem: In , one has to be two standard deviations below the mean to fail medical boards exams. I figure that takes misspelling your name. It isn't like the bar exams with 50% failure rates. The better process for integrating foreign medical graduates is by observing their performance in a clinical setting for an extended period of time. A local problem with FMG's is their clannishness and poor quality health care delivery if you are not one of the clan. I have warned elderly neighbors not to take a referral to any Hindu specialist in Orange County, California. Because, once you've seen one, beware of seeing two more the same clan. I get the "liberal" blah blah and they do it. And they are referred on to one or two Hindu specialist by the first one. Every patient a local Hindu cardiologist sees is referred on to a Hindu Pulmonologist. And y'know there are regular American specialist and other clan FMG's they could have been referred to locally. This experience repeats itself like deja vus 3 times in the last years. Back to the Point: Screw the exam system. Reality works best. Not exactly an internship but, a period of mentoring reviews of their charts and clinical conduct. Moi, M.D. ret. No
There are good and bad in any demographic. My personal lay opinion based on experience is that it is better to have a doctor who is part of a practice with at least two other doctors (i.e. no procedure churning lone wolves who will refer you out if they find anything really wrong with you or 2 doctors with the same credentials/background), and preferably more doctors with varying backgrounds. Based on my dealings with elderly relatives and their medical needs, I found that the best foreign born doctors were usually part of a practice group with an American at the head and that the worst were foreign born doctors who were in charge of their practice. I have found doctors from India/Pakastan more suspect than those from other places.
Being a person who could not get insurance due to a pre-existing condition I went to India for major surgery. I would rank the doctors I had at least the equal of those in the United States. Only major differerence I could see is they seem to care more about their patients.
There a few good ones from those areas in my city, but there are some who have not such great reputations and a couple I have had family member deal with who definitely did not get great care out of them. Your post does raise a caveat. I find that there is a wildly different dynamic between doctors who practice surgery and those who just practice medicine. Most of the foreign doctors I am familiar with or have experiences with are pill pushers, not surgeons. Very few foreign born surgeons in our area and the ones who are tend to be of some Hispanic/Latin America/Cuban background.
