Its report, Millions loaned inappropriately to US nationals at foreign medical schools , noted that 19 state medical licensing boards were approving foreign medical schools or regulating the clinical training of foreign medical students at hospitals in their states, that there were at least 20 medical schools in the Caribbean and Mexico, and that 74 hospitals or other medical facilities were training medical students from foreign medical schools. Since that 1994 report, these numbers have increased substantially, thanks to populous states such as New York and California. The number of offshore medical graduates in the United Kingdom is also growing. The GAO reported that at the time up to 6600 American students were attending medical schools outside the US and Canada, primarily in the Caribbean and Mexico. With few site visits and no formal accreditation programs, there was no way to equate the institutions to mainstream schools.
Supporters say the schools have plenty of evidence of equivalency.
But St. George's and Ross University boast a much higher percentage. We're right at the average of the US school mark. By the end of 1996, St. George's has graduated 2378 students, and 1267 undergraduates have been able to transfer to US schools. The GAO's revelations followed horror stories about some schools being nothing more than diploma mills, and caution has stood Ronald Dalton in good stead. He first applied at another Caribbean school but asked to speak to Canadian students and graduates about their clinical-rotation experiences and satisfaction levels.