IE3 intern heads to Medical School
Noted on May 29, 2012 by IE3 Student in
Ann Oluloro received an IE3 scholarship for summer 2010, and interned abroad with Child Family Health International (CFHI) in La Paz, Bolivia. After graduating from the University of Oregon, she was accepted into five different medical schools and has accepted the offer from Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU). In the interview below, she gives some insight into how her internship with IE3 helped her apply and be accepted to medical schools.
How did your internship experience prepare you for graduate school?
The internship provided me with more basic medical knowledge and knowledge on how to better break down communication and cultural barriers.
Do you feel you internship experience helped you get into graduate school? If so, how?
Without a doubt, I can strongly say that my internship was one of the main factors that helped me to get into medical school. This is because the internship provided me with unique experiences that I was able to include and highlight in my application. At every interview that I attended, my interviewers were generally curious and would ask a lot of questions about my time spent in Bolivia. And of course, I was more than happy to elaborate on my time spent in Bolivia.
Did you talk about your internship experience in application materials or interview? If so, what did you say about your experience?
In general, my interviewers were curious about what I did. I explained to them that the internship was much more than just an observership or shadowing experience. I told them that the internship was very hands on. For example, I charted for doctors/nurses, presented patient cases during daily rounds on the hospital floors, performed physical exams, made house-visits to check on the Chagas infected kids, scrubbed into surgeries, etc. In addition, I elaborated on how I was able to improve my Spanish through our medical Spanish classes and my interactions with the locals.
How may final reporting requirements for IE3 (final reports, inter evaluations, blogs, journals) have helped you to prepare application materials/interview talking points?
My blog was crucial in helping me to write my application because it allowed me to quickly recall all the little details that occurred during my internship that I otherwise might have forgotten.
What do you hope to do after you complete your graduate program? How (if at all) does this relate to your IE3 internship experience or to what you learned from your internship?
After completing my MD/MPH training, I want to dedicate a significant amount of my clinical practice time to practicing medicine in a public health capacity. I also want to focus on clinical research (not exactly sure on the topic). In addition, at some point, I would like to open a public clinic in Nigeria, which I will be able to serve in a couple times a year. Overall, the internship helped me to understand health and the delivery of healthcare in a global context thus motivating me to return back to the Motherland.
Ann also wrote two field notes blogs for the IE3 website while she was abroad which you can read here: General Pediatrics in La Paz and Check mark!.