I came for the Introduction days in January and the MRSA screening was performed on the first day. The second day was full: a presentation of all the services and opportunities that KI could give us, but rights and duties of the students in the morning; then a lunch all together and a guided tour of the campus made by KI current students.
I was staying in Jagargatan, one of KI dormitories for students. I made an application for it and it was accepted. It was a nice place to stay, especially because it was very close from the place I worked and because it gave me the opportunity to meet many other students.
I did not attend activities organised from the University but I attended some other social activities with other students. I made a few Swedish friends since I met only a few of them. Swedish people are very reservate and it is hard to get in touch with them if you do not meet several times. I mostly had contacts with other exchange students. I only attended rotations with exchange students; if I had attended classes with Swedissh students, I would have maybe met more of them.
This was my first time as an exchange student; I wanted to experience something new and improving for myself. I chose KI because it is a high level institution where I knew I would get and learn a lot. I was given all the requested information and support with large advance, and I had no problems in filling my application form and the afterward procedure. I also received by current post all the information and papers on KI and on life in Sweden. It think that it is not enough to truly understand how life is in a foreign country, but it was really helpful.
I was also required to do a MRSA screening when I came here, in order to keep the rate of MRSA infections low in this country. It was a short non-invasive free test. No other vaccination or health certificates were required.
ELAXX6 : Surgery 1
I attended this course in Plastic Surgery. I liked it a lot, since the subject is so wide and it spreads through different kinds of medical problems and operations. All the staff and doctors in the department were really kind and involved me in every procedure or visit they did. I felt really welcomed there and I learnt a lot, both in practice and theory.
The evaluation was made with some papers we had to write: we had to choose some interesting cases or operations. I think this was a really good way to evaluate us, since we had the chance to go through something we actually saw.
I think that the only thing that could be improved was to give the students some schedule to follow.
ELA005 : Internal Medicine 1
This course was attended into four different wards (Cardiology, Endocrinology, Gastroenterology, Emergency Medicine). The staff was nice and involved the students in what they were doing everytime. We were given a schedule to follow every week and we were also organized some seminars about Internal Medicine. The examination was made by writing a report on an interesting clinical case we saw during the internship.
I think that there are no things to improve.
2EE090 : Emergency Medicine
This course was attended at the ER department. All the staff was nice with the students, and tried to involve us in their clinical practice. One of the most important limit was that sometimes there was no time to explain to the exchange students what was happening in English, since the doctors had no time. I understand that this was not the doctor's fault but it gave us less informations and involvement.
The examination was made with a report we had to write about an interesting clinical case we saw in the ER and that we had to discuss with the other exchange students that were there.
This course was the less organized of the ones I attended. We were assigned to a tutor (a doctor working in the ER) and then asked to follow them in their working schedule. The problem was that most of the time they worked only half of the weeks we were supposed to be there and so we had to arrange by ourself to find a new tutor. Another problem was that we were supposed to have seminars during the internship but we received the communications too late, so it was hard to prepare for them.
2EE082 : Clinical rotation, Orthopedic Surgery
This was the first course I attended, so I did not know what to expect from it. We received a detailed schedule of the rotation, and we were given the possibility to attend different activities of orthopedics (ward, orthopedic ER, operating rooms). The staff was nice almost all the times we were there, except from sometimes when we were in the OR: they did not involve us that much and only let us watch from a corner, and they did not explain that much; it was not actually the fault of the doctors since they did not know that we were going to be with them for the day or maybe because we were assigned to doctor who were not that confident with English.
Despite from this, I can't find any other negative aspects in the rotation.
I had a great time at KI, both concerning academic and social life. This experience made me grow as a person and as a clinician; it made my mind open to a differrent culture and I got many things from it.
KI is a very good place to come to study, since there are a lot of opportunities for students and a high level education.
I am generally satisfied of these four months here and I will have wonderful memories.
No, I did not attend any Swedish class and it was really hard at the beginning to understand what was happening around me. I stayed here for 4 months, and I learned some Swedish by myself. It was not that big deal not to know Swedish since English is well spoken by the majority of the population, but during clinical practice it was sometimes frustrating not to understand what the patient was telling the doctor since they were speaking Swedish.