anybody considering hong kong for medic? it's recognised at the very least, and it's supposedly the top uni in asia if you are to compare it to china. plus medium in english as well so.. heehee.

yup, that's true. hk is relatively much more affordable. plus the pool of applicants for hku medic is generally very small compared to that of uk (although admittedly, they are very stingy on the intake). but malaysians have the upperhand as there are a lot of Canto-speaking Msians around and they do favour that in admission. So whilst you get people from US, Asia and all over applying to UK medical schools, there aren't as many applying to HK, mostly deterred by the Canto part and the low intake. anyway, i'm just saying that it's worth a try esp since the non-locals they've taken in so far are mostly malaysians. so basically, chances are, you'll end up just having to compete with ur fellow malaysian buddies for a place. almost like IPTA minus the bumi quota.

I was referring to HKU medic and its applicants. It's partly because of the low intake and partly because you are expected to at least understand some basic cantonese to be able to adapt to the working and studying environment in HK that deters the applications so as a result, the competition is quantitatively less for those who apply despite the low intake if you compare it to say, NUS.

the main uni website: http://www.hku.hk/ . undergrad application website: http://www.hku.hk/admission/ug.htm

yes, malaysia recognises HKU medic.

There were non-fluent canto speakers who applied and got the interview for medic. the interviews are in english and they might ask you to answer 1 question (eg. introduce yourself) in canto just to test your level of canto a bit, but you are not required to produce a Chinese exam result or anything like that so it's generally not that important a requirement. plus there are hk students who grew up abroad, got into the course, and aren't too fluent in canto either so your position shouldn't be that bad. unless all the other applicants you're competing with have perfect canto and perfect qualifications.

Apply, yes; getting a place, not for me to decide.

Perhaps that may be true but there were students with relatively moderate GPAs and A-level results (compared to the >3.5s and straight As in A-levels that are aplenty) that got the interview, though not the offer so I won't say that it's completely hopeless. You might get moderate results but still get a shot to impress during the interviews but you're right in the sense where because there's only a few spots available for non-locals, naturally, they go for the best results + best qualifications combo so in that sense, it might be more competitive than IPTA. speaking of which, i thought those who get 4.0s or equivalent actually get JPA scholarships to study overseas? O_o i heard of someone who got JPA to study medic in London from his outstanding STPM results.

i'm already studying in HKU. i'm just curious to see if there're any potential applicants here as there has been some juniors asking me abt studying here and it's also sort of partly my job as student ambassador to promote the course and uni a little especially since not many malaysians seem to understand what hku or the course is like here. back home, ppl kept asking me 'why HKU', 'why not UK or Australia or India or Russia' and questions like, 'is the course in Canto?' and all that. i knew a lot of ppl who gave me the impression that UK, Aussie, India and Russia are the best places to study medicine and anywhere else is just plain weird. =[

also, the application procedure for medic in HKU especially is pretty mind-boggling. so i thought it'll be helpful to show up in this forum in case anybody needs help with their applications (though i can't guarantee that i'll be available to help 24/7!!!!).

more info abt medic in hk in general: http://hkmed.blogspot.com/
medic in HKU in particular: http://hkmed.blogspot.com/2009/02/hku-medi...admissions.html

*clarification: for the Non-Jupas/International intake in the latter link, they stated 40 places but that includes majority of the HKID holders from abroad. Non-HKID internationals (including most Msians) applying for HKU medic would probably get a quota of 2-3 students per intake (though they say they'll be increasing the numbers).

I am not sure if HKU recognises the matriculation qualification (not many overseas uni do actually) but it's worth a try i guess. i'll pm you my e-mail in a while.

China is 'coming up' but even HK doesn't really recognise a lot of the Chinese doctor grads (according to my HK friends la, i'm not too sure myself, though the fact that Msia doesn't recognise a lot of the unis there seem to indicate this as well). Plus I don't think all the unis are the same when it comes to China. The more 'popular' universities might be the ones with the better facilities etc etc so it depends on which university you're applying to and not the country as a whole. =/

In my batch, I don't know how many applications they received but I heard the admin quote a very vague 'hundreds of applicants'. 12 people were selected for the interview I went for. Amongst the 12, 11 were Malaysians. 2 got the offer, 1 rejected the offer for ASEAN and so, they gave his offer to a waitlisted applicant. In total, 3 offers were made, 2 accepted the offer.

That's because they send many students to study in said countries and many students themselves go to these countries for medic so it'll be kind of ironic to have many Malaysians studying medic there only to not be allowed to come back and work in the country. It's probably a trend thing. Singapore is not Malaysia. Haven't heard of many Singaporeans going to Egypt to study medic. O_o China probably.

Ah well. Everybody wants to be doctor. The country needs doctors. It'll only hurt both the gov and country if they deny these students the right to come back and work for the country anyway. Unless they provide enough affordable medical schools to produce enough doctors for the country. Or else I don't see why they should impose a restriction. Or they can have more stringent licensing exams. Whatever it is, I think it all boils down to meeting to demand for doctors and making people happy because their kids can now study medic practically anywhere and not worry abt whether they can play doctor back home.

i think if you're really hardcore on becoming a doctor and if it's the only thing you set your mind to do, then such statistics won't matter, because if you're passionate and determined enough in your field, you wouldn't mind working harder to achieve what you want whether or not there's competition involved.

so, 'it's alright. i'll be a great doc'.