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med.rome, Rome (2025)

27/09/2022

GRADUATION DAY 👩‍🎓

After 6 years of medical school, passing 36 exams, living in Rome for 5 years and in Germany for 1 year, writing and defending my thesis, I can say that I am officially a Medical Doctor!

I received my MD degree (with Honors) on July 12th, after presenting and defending my thesis that day. My thesis topic was related to dermatology, my favorite specialty.

June was quite a busy month, since it was filled with studying for my last exams, finishing my thesis and celebrating the graduation of my fellow classmates.

In my next post I am planning to describe how graduation and the thesis defense work at my university.

07/04/2022

Recently I won a “Student-collaboration Scholarship” (Borsa di collaborazione). The activity is for students enrolled in years following the first. Awarded students work at university structures such as libraries, lecture rooms, information services, laboratories etc. The contract includes 150 hours, usually divided into maximum 4 hour shifts per day. The total payment amounts to 1295€ in the academic year 2021/2022. One may apply for maximum 8 calls per year, however the contract may be signed only for 1 scholarship. Students are selected based on their grade average and number of exams passed (credits).

I have just started this week and so far my responsibilities included organizing articles in the Scopus system (Elsevier’s abstract and citation database, similar to PubMed) for the Head of the Department, as well as working at the lecture room (study hall / library). From what I know, later we will also have to reorganize some of the books in the department.

18/02/2022

4 exams left until graduation! 📚👩‍🎓

In March I will start my internship at the General Practitioner’s office. It will take 5 weeks. In the meantime I should also receive some information about my UK Foundation Programme application 🇬🇧 So far I haven’t received any news regarding my SJT score nor any other updates. Hopefully I will also find out soon which city and department I have been assigned to in Brazil, where I am planning to spend all of August doing a practical internship from IFMSA (SISM) 🇧🇷

For now I am trying to enjoy my free moments in sunny Rome ☀️🇮🇹

01/02/2022

A skiing day trip is something I really needed. I have 5 exams left until graduation and I cannot wait to be done with the February exam session.

I have been less active here and in general on social media because I am trying to focus on studying. I hope everything will go well.

In March I will start my 3rd and last part of the obligatory TPVES internship - the 5-week-long rotation at the General Practicioner’s office. I am looking forward to it and hoping to learn a lot.

30/12/2021

Merry Christmas and a Happy upcoming New Year! 🎊

December 2021 was quite intense for me so I did not post much on social media and now am making the time to rest before the New Year starts.

This month I have officially finished my Surgical and Internal Medicine internships, however I still need to receive the Professors’ signatures. On top of my 2 medical school exams (Diseases of Sensory Organs - Maxillofacial Surgery and Oral Pathology and Movement Disorders - Rheumatology) I also took the Situational Judgment Test (SJT) for the 2-year UK Foundation Programme (UKFP).

I have around half of a year left until the end of medical school. Exactly 6 exams to do until graduation and I also need to write and defend my master thesis. Ahead of me are also 5-week-long practicals in March at the General Practitioner’s office (GP) as part of the TPVES internships.

In the upcoming New Year I hope to post more on social media, however only time will tell 🙈

Currently I am also working on my IFMSA application to Brazil 🇧🇷 I am in the process of choosing the cities, one of which I will spend a month in doing practicals at the hospital as part of the SCOPE exchange program 😊

17/11/2021

This week I am doing a takeover for so make sure to check out their stories and mine! I even finally had the time to show some bits and pieces of the Policlinico Umberto I hospital in which we have practicals. The hospital tour and some other interesting stories are saved in my story highlights “Year 6” or “Daily Life 🇮🇹”, so in case you missed something you can always catch up or rewatch it!

This week I have started my Internal Medicine rotation, which is part of the obligatory TPVES internship (tirocinio abilitante). These three 5-week-long practicals, which amount to a minimum of 100 hours each, are required to be finished before graduation. The mandatory disciplines are Surgery, Internal Medicine and General Practice (GP). I managed to do the surgical part in Germany, however I still have to complete the latter two. We keep a diary log of the activities that we do each day in our dedicated booklets. In the mornings we go to the hospital for TPVES (in groups of max 5 people) and then in the afternoon we all meet in class in presence for lectures.

If you have any questions or comments, feel free to express your thoughts below! ⬇️

10/10/2021

First week of university 🇮🇹

Keeping a healthy life-work balance, which so far is perfect, however I know it will be harder once we start practicals and once I start working on my thesis. On the right hand side of the collage are pictures I took this week at the university and on the left are the ones I took while enjoying some time off in the eternal city 😊

We are back to classes in presence, which feel like a huge change after 1.5 years of lectures online. So far we have only had Public Health during which we learned a bit about the organization of healthcare systems and we will learn more about economics in that context. We also reviewed some statistics, which in my opinion might be useful for our thesis preparation.

One of my classmates proposed organizing a class aperitivo that took place on Friday. It was a great beginning of the new academic year and the new semester. I was glad to meet everyone and have a chat on various topics ☺️

Let’s hope the upcoming week will be as good as my first week of 6th year!

06/10/2021

IMAT 2021 rankings are out! 🇮🇹🩺

Today officially both EU and non-EU candidates could find out if they have been admitted to Medical School in Italy!

has put together a table (link in their bio) to show all the minimum scores of EU students so far. New rankings will come out each week, so the minimal scores will change.

For non-EU students - there are lists of students published for each University. Since non-EU applicants only have one choice they can find out all the information on the website of the University of their choice.

If you have any questions then feel free to comment down below! ⬇️

Hope to see many of you on October 25th (start of classes for first year students at )! 😊

05/10/2021

My last “first day” of medical school was yesterday! 🩺

My journey in the International Medical School is slowly coming to an end. As the saying goes “it’s the beginning of the end”. I hope this year will bring fruitful work, it will be full of personal growth and development, a wonderful ending of my final moments as a university student.

We have received our schedule and for now we are covering all the lectures of Public Health. Yesterday we learned a bit about health systems in the world and today we had a lesson on quantitative methods (measures of frequency and association). We have a “block” of lectures in that subject for now, so we will finish it by November 11th. Other students will also follow classes in gynecology, pediatrics, internal medicine and surgery, however I will have to catch up with 5th year subjects (due to Erasmus) in the meantime.

Next week we will also start TPVES (tirocinio abilitante), which is an obligatory internship each student has to do in order to graduate. It includes three 5-week-long rotations in surgery, internal medicine and at the general practitioner. I did the surgical practicals in Bonn, so I should only have to do surgery and GP internships.

One more important task for this year is getting my thesis done, which is another requirement for graduation. I am trying to get an approval from my supervisor as quickly as possible.

For residency applications my goals are Germany, Italy, Switzerland and the UK. For Germany and Switzerland the first step I am taking is getting the B2 German language certificate (Goethe Zertifikat). For Italy - in November I will start my preparatory course for the residency entrance exam. For the UK - I am applying for the F1 year of the Foundation Programme and so far I have received Eligibility to apply, chosen my preferences of the deaneries (regions) and booked the Situational Judgment Test (SJT) exam for December.

My Erasmus documents are still being processed and I am waiting for recognition. I am planning to prepare a post as soon as I am done with all the paperwork.

That’s a brief summary of what is going on at the moment 😊

6th year - here I come! ✨

03/10/2021

6th year of medical school starts tomorrow!

My last year of medical school will start tomorrow (October 4th) and I am excited but also a bit stressed. This mix of emotions will most probably keep me company throughout the entire academic year. If everything goes according to plan then in one year I will be a fully licensed doctor. This means making my dream come true but also a lot of responsibility.

I am planning to use this year for gaining more clinical experience and my goal is to try to be as prepared for the job as possible. Hopefully I will keep learning foreign languages in the meantime.

More updates coming soon and I hope all of you will enjoy this journey with me!🎢

02/09/2021

IMAT is just 1 week away!

The test is just around the corner. IMAT 2021 is going to take place on September 9th 2021. Since the exam is so soon, I decided to share some of my last minute tips! Here are my top 10 😊 Hope you all will enjoy this post and good luck to all the candidates🍀

Are you ready for the IMAT? 📚l

17/07/2021

How to choose the right University? 🇮🇹

There are still a few days left until the IMAT 2021 registration closes, so I wanted to share a few of my tips on how to choose the right University in Italy for studying medicine in English.

First of all, my advice is to choose a city that you would enjoy living in for the next 6 years. Let’s face it - 6 years is not a short amount if time (even though it’s flying by for me). Think of whether there are things to do that you enjoy, whether it is connected well to your home city/country. Think of the costs of fees, costs of living.

Second of all, I suggest trying to connect with students at the preferred universities and getting inside information about the course itself. Also, keep in mind that it is worth taking into consideration extracurricular opportunities, for example my university has the .eu program, some universities in the northern part of Italy have the , so it might be worth taking those opportunities into consideration.

My next piece of advice would be not to really look at rankings too closely, as the factors taken into ranking lists often do not represent the particular course. Even if they are specifically focused on medicine - they tend to show the situation both in the Italian and English courses together and not separately.

Lastly, if you are an EU candidate, then I suggest not putting universities on the top of the list just because they showed lower IMAT score thresholds in the previous years. If anything - do the opposite. If you get into the university of your 1st choice then the other choices automatically become unavailable, so you lose your other possibilities.

Choose wisely and good luck to all!🍀

15/06/2021

Ophtalmology and ENT Practicals in Bonn 🇩🇪

In the 2nd semester of 5th year at my home university (La Sapienza Roma) in Italy 🇮🇹 we have a subject called „Diseases of the Sensory Organs”. It consists of Ophthalmology, ENT and Audiology, Maxillofacial Surgery and Odontostomatologic Diseases.

Unfortunately I was not able to have all of the subjects recognized in my Erasmus, however I did manage to cover ENT and Ophthalmology. The lectures from these subjects are uploaded on an online platform and we had 2 days of practicals in each department.

First in Ophthalmology I spent a day in the outpatient clinic, where I learned how to use a slit lamp. The next day I spent 1hr practicing how to use an Indirect Ophthalmoscope on a Virtual Reality Simulator and then went to the OR, to watch two surgeries 👁

In the ENT (Ears, Nose, Throat) Department we could choose to go to surgery, spend time in the ward or in the outpatient clinic. I was assigned to the ward on day 1 and then to the outpatient clinic on day 2.

I really enjoyed both practicals and was surprised by how much I liked them. I have not considered a specialty in Ophthalmology nor ENT before, however at the moment I could see myself working in one of those fields. Only time will tell.. 😊

PS. If you missed some stories from my practicals - check out my story highlight “Practicals in Bonn”.

14/05/2021

Summary of my 1st month of the Summer Semester in Germany 🇩🇪

This semester is extremely busy. To be honest I barely have any free time, however the time that I do have I try to use for hiking, visiting interesting places in the region and relaxing outside.

I took part in 3 extracurricular workshops so far: on blood drawing and peripheral venous catheter placement, Basic Life Support (BLS), knot-tying. I also had to take part in the Pediatric Advanced Life Support (PALS) and Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support (ACLS) courses as part of my Emergency Medicine classes.

Apart from that I have many practical activities - maybe not as many as I wish and maybe not all are extremely interactive, however I am still happy that I am allowed to take part in the practicals that do take place.

Some departments organized the practicals extremely well and even if only one day was in presence or all were on zoom they still felt very useful. On the other hand some departments were not prepared to take in 10 students at once and provided little support with a small amount of patient interaction. I hope that this issue occurs only because of the current epidemioogical situation and that before the pandemic everything was running smoothly.

It is really hard to judge objectively, since I only have a comparison with my practicals in Italy before the pandemic. Currently, I know that in Rome many practicals do take place, especially the „tirocinio abilitante”, which is an obligatory 3-month-long internship, required to graduate from Italian universities.

Overall, I keep myself busy and try to use every moment and every chance to do something in practice. Last week I did not get the chance to see a cardiac surgery (only 4 out of 10 students could go), so I hope to be able to go to general surgery next week.

This is my update on the practicals and my experience so far, but of course I will keep you all posted! 😊

29/04/2021

Practicals in Germany 🇩🇪🩺👩‍⚕️

Many of you have asked me what the practicals look like in German hospitals as part of the training in medical school. First of all, it is still hard for me to compare it to Italy, because I have only had 2 weeks of practicals in Bonn so far. Another aspect is the fact that due to the pandemic many activities have been cancelled or changed into online-practicals via zoom.

From April 12th until April 22nd I had a practical in Neurology, which was my first ever practical in Bonn. In the 1st semester (Winter Semester) Erasmus students were not allowed to follow practicals, even if those were conducted online. These activities are organized as “Blocks” (they are called Blockpraktikum), which means that we have mostly 1-2 weeks in each department in total and only the lectures take place throughout the entire semester.

Neurology was done mostly online via zoom and we had 1 day in presence in groups of 2-3 people. The first three days, even though online, were very well organized. I learned a lot and we were even allowed to take the patients’ history through zoom!

On the first days we reviewed the most common diseases, repeated the steps of a proper neurological examination, conducted a few anamneses with real patients.

On the day in presence we first examined a few patients under the guidance of our Professor (while other students joined us on zoom) and then me and the 2 other students were asked to visit two patients in the ward, take their history, examine them and later report back to the Professor what our observations are and what diagnoses we suspect.

This part of the practical was definitely the most exciting but also quite stressful. It made me realize how much responsibility I will have on my shoulders after graduation - in just 1.5 years. Also, unfortunately the language still felt like a barrier to me, as some patients had accents or did not speak extremely clearly.

We consulted our findings with the Professor and then went to visit the patients again to check on them and update their status. We were also shown some extra techniques for physical examination in these particular cases.

18/04/2021

The Summer Semester has started! 🌸

My second semester on Erasmus in Bonn, Germany 🇩🇪 has officially started on Monday, April 12th.

The week before the start I have received tons of emails on organizational matters. I had to pick up 10 fast antigen Sars-Cov-2 tests, buy FFP2 masks, receive my hospital badge (via post), pick up my lab coat on the day of practicals. In summary - a lot was happening in the last few days and this second semester definitely started with a bang 💥

The plan for the next few months is to study: Surgery, ENT (Ears, Nose, Throat), Ophtalmology, Orthopedics, Emergency Medicine, Neurology and do practicals in Gynecology. This means taking 7 subjects and I hope I will be able to keep up with all of my courses and successfully pass all of the exams at the end.

Apart from 8 weeks of practicals I also have lectures and these take place almost every day, so most of my days are full (mornings are dedicated to practicals and afternoons to lectures).

The lectures will take place up until the 23rd of July and our exams are planned for the last week of July and the first week of August.

In one of my next posts I will talk more about how the practicals look like (we also have some on zoom 👀) and hopefully soon I can prepare a post comparing Italy to Germany.

Wish me luck this semester because it is definitely going to be a busy and challenging one!

22/03/2021

Facing challenges 💪

Before starting my exchange in Germany many people asked me if I am sure of what I am doing. Many were shocked by my decision to leave Rome and go to Germany for a year. What was more surprising for most is the fact that for 10 months I would be studying medicine in German, since Germany does not offer medicine in English.

I knew it would be very challenging, however I decided to try my best and go for it. Of course it was not easy to adjust and in my first classes I thought that maybe everyone else was right and I did in fact make a huge mistake.

However, after translating all the slides into English and analzying each lecture for 3 hours, I noticed that with time I only had to translate some parts of lectures, with time only some specific words... so I could notice improvement 😊

I definitely left my comfort zone of studying in English and this first semester was very challenging, but in the end I managed to pass all five of my exams (Gynecology, Pediatrics, Internal Medicine, Psychiatry, Immunology and Infectiology).

The exams were also in a different form than what I encountered in Italy, my preparation needed adjustments too, however I will make a post about exams in Italy vs Germany very soon.

My last exam took place on March 1st and ever since I have a break until April 12th. i keep myself busy by working, travelling in the region and going to museums.

My next semester should have not only online lectures but also practicals in presence, so I am very excited! 😊

17/03/2021

Working as a (medical) student in Germany 🇩🇪

Is this even possible? Yes, it is!

In this explain how does it work and why did I decide to have a job.

Introduction:

In Germany it is possible to have a so-called “minijob”, which means that the worker cannot earn more than 450€ per month. The maximum amount usually corresponds to around 10-15 hours of work per week. Minimum wage in Germany for 2020 was 9.35€ per hour. Up to the 450€ mark we don’t have to pay taxes nor social insurance, then up to 784€ per month we can get tax return, whereas when making more than 784€ per month both taxes and social insurance must be payed.

How to find a job/minijob?

At the university website, Facebook groups, Fachschaft (Student Council) website..

Why did I decide to get a job?

So far I only did a trial day and today was my first official day but I think what I am doing and learning will be very good for the future. My main task at the moment is drawing blood and I am focusing on gaining experience (training is my main goal). In Germany doctors should also know how to draw blood well, so it is important for me to practice, since I am considering Germany as a future destination for my residency.

I am not sure yet how much I will work because I am still waiting for an official plan of my second semester at the University, however it will probably be either 5 or 10 hours per week (1 or 2 days per week).

04/03/2021

It’s been exactly 1 year since I had a lecture in presence.

One year ago my first day (and only day in presence) of the 2nd semester of 4th year started off well.

At 6 am I took a flight from Poland to Rome, landed at 9am and went straight to class, which started at 11am. I was very happy to have made it on time and everything was going great. The semester started off wonderfully. I remember we had radiology in which we learned about how the ultrasound works and then we had pharmacology. The pharmacology professors kept checking their phones for alerts, since we already knew Universities in the North of Italy are closing due to the coronavirus. However, the lecture went on. At one point one of our professors stopped the class and said “It’s official, university will be closed. Don’t come in tomorrow”. We all thought it’s okay because it’s only going to be closed from the 5th to the 15th of March...

I was quite mad that I flew in from my break only for one day of University, but I thought “It’s alright, all of my classmates will be back on the 15th of march”.

In February we did not have classes, but only exams and then after finishing exams many students went back to their home countries or cities. I decided to use my break for attending a dermatological conference, which this year will take place online.

I can’t believe that it’s been a year... I miss going to university, I miss my classmates, friends, flatmates and what I miss the most academically are practicals in the hospital (I had none this past year).

I really hope the situation will improve but only time will tell. Let’s hope for the best.

02/03/2021

I was selected as a finalist for the Care Concept Scholarship “Welcome to Germany” 🇩🇪 and to win I need to gather the highest amount of votes. The scholarship will provide support during my next semester in Germany. To vote you only need to select my name (Karolina) and then write down your name, surname and email.
The link to vote is down below!

Zostałam finalistką konkursu o stypendium Care Concept „Witamy w Niemczech”, aby wygrać potrzebuję jak największej ilości głosów. Stypendium będzie dla mnie ogromnym wsparciem podczas kolejnego semestru w Niemczech. Do zagłosowania wystarczy wybrać moje imię z listy finalistów (Karolina) i wpisać swoje dane (imię i nazwisko oraz adres email). Link do głosowania to:

https://www.care-student.de/krankenversicherung/leben_lernen_studieren_deutschland/studentenversicherung/welcome_to_germany_stipendium_abstimmung_eng.php

Thank you in advance!

Z góry bardzo dziękuję!

06/02/2021

Medical Practicals in Rome 🇮🇹🩺

Hi everyone! Most of you voted on my story to make a post about organizing medical practicals in Rome. These may take place during the summer, but don’t have to 😊

1. WHEN TO APPLY? 🗓

I think it is best to apply as soon as possible. If you have decided that you want to go abroad, you either won/are applying for an Erasmus Traineeship Scholarship or you know you have the financial resources to cover your stay - I’d recommend applying for the practicals right away!

2. WHO CAN APPLY? 🗳

At my University (La Sapienza Roma) only students in their clinical years (4-6) are accepted. From what I know people who graduated are not accepted, unless they have won an Erasmus Traineeship Scholarship.

3. HOW TO APPLY? 📝

If you google “REGULATION FOR INCOMING STUDENTS DEGREE PROGRAMMES IN MEDICINE AND SURGERY” you will see an entire page with all the rules on how to apply for an “incoming student” position at La Sapienza. Please read it because there are a lot of important details!

There are 2 ways of applying: emailing Professors yourself or applying through the Incoming Med office, which helps you with finding a Professor that you will be assigned to.

Most students choose the “Incoming Med” office route and send an email to the address (incomingmed@uniroma1.it) given on the website I mentioned, in order to send their application.

4. WHAT TO INCLUDE IN YOUR APPLICATION? 🤔

If you email the “Incoming Med” office you need to include your name, year of study, university name, city and country of where your university is located, preferred dates of the practicals (compatible with the rules/guidelines online), preferred departments.

4. ACCOMMODATION 🏠

My university does not provide accommodation for incoming students (unless you come for an IFMSA/SISM exchange). You will need to pay for your own accommodation and you will need to find a place by yourself. There are various websites, Facebook groups and also a University organization called “Sturent” that can be useful while looking for a place to stay.
___________________

If you have any more questions - feel free to comment down below! I hope you found this pos

24/12/2020

Merry Christmas! 🎄

This year has definitely been full of surprises for everyone and for a very long time I was not sure if I will be able to fly back to my home country for Christmas.

I feel very blessed that I can spend Christmas with my close family, in my home country.

I wish all of you happiness, safety and health. I hope everyone is celebrating Christmas (and spendintg this festive season) in the way that they wished for.

Happy holidays to everyone! ❤️

23/12/2020

I passed my exam! ✅

I am so happy to have passed the exam called “Applied Pathology 1”. It consisted of Cardiology, Cardiac Surgery, Thoracic Surgery, Vascular Surgery and Pulmonology. It was the last exam from 4th year of medical school that I had to do, so now I am up to date with all my exams and feel very relieved.

The exam was oral, online through google meet. Each student was examined by a professor in each field. We had 5 professors present and since exams in Italy are public everyone can hear what you are saying (including all the professors and all the students). Luckily, it was only me and my friend taking the exam so the audience was quite limited, which stressed me a bit less.

Although it’s just one exam that I have passed I wanted to write about it here because I really appreciate the help from my friend who repeated with me. Repeating out loud and studying at airports was definitely an interesting experience 😅

Now I will take a break for Christmas and rest a bit before the January and February exam marathon. Hope all of you will have great holidays filled with love and health! 😊

Happy Holidays! And Merry Christmas! 🎄

PS. Photo was taken pre-covid in Rome.

13/12/2020

3000 followers - thank you all so much! 😊

I want to make this post to thank everyone who supports me on this journey, I want to share my experience with hopes to inspire others. Numbers are not the most important thing to me but I am glad that people are interested in what I do and what I have to share. Even if I help one person with my advice or my posts, I feel accomplished.

I wanted to make an account that will mostly be useful to others and show that it is possible to go and study abroad. I want to share with all of you how I did it and how you can do it too! I have studied in 4 countries so far (Poland, Italy, USA, Germany) and I cannot wait to see what the future will bring.

I have some ideas on what I want to post here and make sure to follow my stories on instagram to help me decide on what posts to make first. If you have any ideas or posts you would like to read about - please write a comment under this post! ⬇️

Thank you all so much!

Picture: From my pre-covid travels in Sweden 🇸🇪

07/12/2020

Specialization in Italy 🇮🇹

After finishing 6 years of medical school one may choose to do their residency (specializzazione) in Italy. A resident is a doctor but still has to train to get their specialty title e.g. gynecologist, surgeon, cardiologist.

Specialization is basically a full time job, so we work as doctors and focus on a specific field of our choice. In Italy it is done only in Italian and most specialties last 3-6 years.

To be accepted one has to take a national test that takes place once a year. This test is in Italian and cannot be taken until after graduation. There are 140 multiple choice questions and we have 210 minutes to solve it.

The maximum score of a candidate is 147 points - 140 for the test and 7 points for your medical school performance (final grade, average), as well as other degrees.

For a correct answer we get 1 point, no answer 0 points and a wrong answer means a -0.25 mark.

Is it hard to get in?
In 2019, 18 733 candidates took the test to compete for 8776 spots across the entire country.

How is the situation in 2020?

As one might imagine the answer to this question is “not so good”. Especially in this case and surprisingly the severity and difficulty of the situation was caused not only by Covid-19.

This year the exam took place on September 22. It was a very unusual year for the Italian healthcare system, that had to face many challenges. Yet thousands of young doctors still have to wait to be able to work and train, since the graduatoria (the official ranking and assignments of candidates) has not been published yet. Yet. And it is currently December. Not only is there a pandemic and doctors are in need, especially in Italy, but also most of these people are unemployed and waiting to be given the opportunity to work. 23 756 doctors took the test and are already waiting for more than 2.5 months. 14 455 places available this year, so thousands of unfilled residency spots. Some departments rely a lot on residents and I imagine it is a real struggle for them to work without the extra help during the second wave of the pandemic.

More about the situation: