Carribean Med School or CRNA
Hello,
I am a 23 year old (M) nurse in a Level 1 Surgical ICU. I’m currently in a situation where I need advice. I have all the required things to apply to CRNA school which was my intended goal since graduationing Nursing school, but after actually working in the ICU and working with Anesthesiologist I’ve learned that if I truly want to gain knowledge and learn the massive information I want too I feel I would be doing my self a disservice going into CRNA school. I’ve noticed a lot of the higher acuity cases or cases that prompt more learning are usually given to the Anesthesiologist Resident vs CRNA/SRNA. Of course that’s not the situation everywhere but it just began to dawn on me and caused me to reflect a lot on if that was route I truly wanted to persue. Now to mention another reason I’m leaning towards medical school is because of the vastly larger financial assistance. Since the BBB was signed it isn’t really favorable for CRNA school assistance.
The hospital I work for is also affiliated with a medical school so I’ve thought about pursuing the Post Bacc MD program that basically guarantees a seat if you can finish the 2 year program and obtain a 502 MCAT but I just fear I wouldn’t do well on MCAT and the program takes 2 years.
The reason I would be leaning towards carribean medical school is mainly because it would allow me to avoid the MCAT and save me atleast 2-3 years. I’m aware of the main reasons people avoid carribean medical schools and it seems that the general consensus is that.
- It’s expensive
- It’s very difficult to match
- It’s an entire new environment in a different country
- The schools have a high attrition rate.
- They are for profit
Now sorta to recap my reasoning for going I believe it being expensive isn’t enough for me to completely exclude it. Now as far as the matching I was curious if my ICU experience as a Nurse would hold any weight. Considering at least at my university hospital I’m familiar with almost all the program directors I would assume that could work in my favor but who knows. I believe my ICU experience should give a little bump with making connections but who knows. Now for the different environment my father is a carribean man and I’ve always wanted to explore my roots so I could benefit from that. Now I can’t speak for the last two but I just need some advice. Thanks in advance and sorry if everything is clustered.