Test Tied to Slip in Foreign Applicants for Medical Residencies

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Test Tied to Slip in Foreign Applicants for Medical Residencies

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


HICAGO, Sept. 3 - The number of foreign medical school graduates who are seeking training in the United States has plummeted since the start of an expensive new test that requires them to demonstrate skills in English, a study has found.

The number of foreign graduates taking the examination, required of applicants for residencies and fellowships, fell by more than half from 1997 to last year, to 16,828 from 36,231, the study said. The decline coincided with a requirement instituted in 1998 that the foreign applicants pass a clinical skills assessment, in which they have to communicate with fake patients in English and are scored on the encounters.

The authors of the study suggested that foreign students might be dissuaded by the prospect of having their English evaluated. The authors also cited the $1,200 cost of the test and the expense of traveling to Philadelphia, the sole examination site.

The president of the American College of International Physicians, Dr. Alex Yadao, said the examination and other required tests, as well as the travel expenses, could total thousands of dollars.

"Foreign doctors cannot afford that," Dr. Yadao said.

The study, by the Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates, appears on Wednesday in The Journal of the American Medical Association.

The longer-term downward trend "could have a significant impact on the overall graduate medical education population and the resulting U.S.
medical work force," the researchers said, because foreign medical graduates consistently represent one-fourth of both groups.

A similar clinical-skills test proposed for American medical students has prompted objections from the American Medical Association and other groups concerned about the cost and effectiveness of the examination.