Med schools around the world are allowing students to graduate early

To aid overwhelmed healthcare services in handling the COVID-19 pandemic, medical schools around the world have pushed up exams and graduations to ensure that qualified people can enter the workforce and lend a helping hand.

“Anticipating a surge in the number of COVID-19 hospital patients, the deans of the four Massachusetts medical schools have agreed to the state’s request to move up the graduation dates of their fourth-year medical students,” a statement posted to the Boston University website declared on Thursday.

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This decision will ensure students will be able to join the healthcare sector upwards of eight weeks sooner than they would have been able to.

It also means that 192 fourth-year Boston University School of Medicine students will be graduating on April 17 instead of the previously scheduled May 17.

The post continues that in a conversation on Wednesday with the deans of medical schools at Boston University, Harvard, and Tufts, as well as the University of Massachusetts, Marylou Sudders, Secretary of Health and Human Services, urged educational institutions to move up their graduation dates.

She also vowed to speed up the licensing process of the state’s approximately 700 fourth-year medical students.

Similarly, New York University’s (NYU) Grossman School of Medicine announced on Wednesday that it is pending approval to allow select medical students to graduate early.

Excited to share that pending approval from @NYSEDNews and #LCME, @NYUGrossman will allow select medical students to graduate early to get more physicians into the health system more quickly, as we fight the growing spread of #COVID19 #allhandsondeck #NYULangoneHeroes

— NYU Grossman School of Medicine (@nyugrossman) March 25, 2020

Across the pond, medical schools in Ireland are taking the same initiative.

The Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RSCI) announced that it would be fast-tracking its exams, limiting study time from seven weeks to seven days.

“The students will complete their remaining written exams online in the coming weeks and students will graduate virtually by the end of April,” President of RCSI, Kenneth Mealy, said in a statement on the College’s website.

National University of Ireland (NUI) Galway also moved up their summer exams to ensure that hundreds of medical students would be able to contribute their efforts in the ongoing fight against coronavirus.