One of the best kept secrets in Caribbean Medical Schools | Trinity School of Medicine | international medical schools

Kingstown, St. Vincent -  Trinity Medical Sciences University,  is pleased to announce the dedication and renaming of its learning centre in honor of Sir Frederick N. Ballantyne, GCMG, MD. 

We are pleased to announce residency match results for 2019! Once again, Trinity graduates continue to represent our school in placements at top healthcare institutions across the U.S., as a wide range of states are covered in this year's match.

Trinity School of Medicine has always prided itself on the strength and ambition of its students. So many future physicians come our way looking for something new; whether that's a unique learning environment built on support and a strong relationship with the faculty, a curriculum with an emphasis on clinical skills and service to patients, or just a true opportunity to live up to their potential. 


In this latest edition of our alumni spotlight, meet Dr. Julius Balogh. Read about growing up in Toronto and Hamilton, his first career as a nurse, attending Trinity, the value of hard work, and doing surgical and anesthesiology residencies in the great state of Texas. 

There are a lot of spectacular reasons to earn a masters degree. From personal academic enrichment to general career planning, all the way down to specific job requirements, graduate degrees are a viable path to expertise and growth. A masters degree is not, however, a requirement to practice medicine, nor even a recommendation. Despite this, they have become a begrudgingly common method for attempting to pad a GPA after a difficult admissions cycle in a US and Canadian medical school admissions process already placing too many barriers in front of qualified applicants. Today, we're going to look at this phenomenon, dig into some data, talk to our students, and offer some insight into why it may not be what it's cracked up to be and what other options may be out there for you.

Earlier this month, the World Pediatric Project (WPP) held its first mission for 2019 in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.  Its focus was on general pediatric surgery with Dr. Jeffrey Lukish, pediatric surgeon from Children’s National Hospital in Washington DC as team leader. 

For the unaware, the WPP offers surgical and diagnostic care to children in the Eastern Caribbean and has been actively working in St. Vincent and the Grenadines since 2002. Trinity School of Medicine students are frequently in the mix with them in a volunteer/learning capacity. This mission was no different, with Trinity students taking part, re-dedicating the school to clinical education and community service.  The busy visit was a productive one. On consultation day alone, forty-one local children, and an additional fifteen from neighboring islands, were seen by Trinity students and the visiting team of surgeons. 

In Canada in 2017, only 2,617 of the 13,690 applicants were admitted to medical schools. An astonishing 81% of the applicants- many of whom would make phenomenal physicians- found themselves rejected at home. For many people considering medicine, becoming a doctor is a calling. So, a large percentage of those Canadian applicants without a seat looked abroad—most of them to the Caribbean, but some considering Ireland, Australia, and Eastern Europe as well. But, what happens when school is over? In 2018, of the 1,758 international medical graduates (IMGs)- most of whom were Canadians that tried to match back home- only 123 were selected. This is by no means to say that this isn't still a viable path for Canadians, and a fair number of Trinity graduates have matched in places like Ontario, Calgary, British Columbia, Alberta, and Manitoba.  

The point is that the decision to study abroad is a major one, with many factors to consider, from proximity to home, to academic approach, matching, cost, and long term career plans.

On Tuesday, we hinted that we had something say about the United States and Canadian application systems and the challenges they had for most applicants. Well, today's the day. We're going to cover something that's long been an elephant in the room for medical schools across the hemisphere.

Getting into US and Canadian medical schools is a numbers game. And the rules don't add up.

Last week, we published data that gave insight into this year's match for Trinity and its graduates. As a follow up, we're going to break down some of the complexities at play in the match itself, and give guidance to medical students, present and future, on how, and where, Trinity students go that extra mile and succeed.

There has been a flurry of coverage on international medical education, lately. These pieces have painted an interesting picture of the sometimes under-noticed benefits to patients and hospitals as well as the pragmatic and necessary contributions to public health. We thought we'd weigh in on these and offer some of our own perspective.