New Med Schools lock out home students

[giveandtake]

Story in the Sunday Times yesterday.

Brunel and Chester will only train lucrative international students, who pay £45,000 per year.

Presumably, the students will be taught by a fair number of medical professors; the latter trained by the tax funded NHS; in taxpayer funded hospitals and grant supported institutions.

Meanwhile, homegrown pupils with A stars and first class degrees, are left to wither on the vine, such is the ridiculous competition for places.

This is shameful and demotivating/insulting to our students, led to believe that merit and hard work may give them a chance at a medical career.

Once trained, what is to prevent the newly trained fledgling medics from returning overseas?

Sorry all… I didn’t mean a gap yah. I meant work in Asda or in a hospital. Anything really. And not just medics - the same is true of any HCP I think. Yes, there are wonderful nurses, mw, pharmacists etc who have only ever done that… but some life experience really adds another layer. I can’t explain and I know I’m generalising.

That said, I feel so sorry for the med students when we interview them. It’s such a horrible course and then when they qualify they are treated like crap and shunted all round the deanery for the best part of a decade. It’s a dogs life. Yes it gets better, but not until you hit your mid thirties. I’d hate anyone I loved to do it now. I just pity them.

They are taking clinical placements that could be used for UK students. And they are costing the NHS as there is a limit on the number of placements possible.

How many fewer domestic-trained medical students is govt funding now compared to recent past years?
200? Are there 200 fewer funded places at medical schools in 2022+ than compared to 2020?

AgathaMystery

I get what you mean, and all hcps benefit from life experience. But for doctors the undergrad and postgrad obligatory training is so long, and the pay reaches the oft quoted amount after being an NHS consultant for 20 years ( so you might have few enough working years actually on this). So if there were any other barriers, I doubt anyone would want to do it.

I couldn’t recommend medicine to anyone because of many factors, including all you describe.