Læknaneminn - 01.04.2018, Side 76

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Margir íslenskir læknanemar
hafa lagt land undir fót og
kynnst heilbrigðiskerfum
í öðrum löndum í gegnum
skiptinám. Hingað til lands
kemur einnig fjöldi skiptinema
á hverju ári til að gera slíkt
hið sama. Læknaneminn fékk
einn slíkan skiptinema, Ester
Bonanno sem lærir læknisfræði
í Perugia á Ítalíu, til að skrifa
um reynslu sína hér á landi.
Once in Iceland I heard the expression “the
Icelandic experience” hundreds of times. I
think the best summary of my clerkship lies
in this phrase since I had, what we could
consider, a real Icelandic experience. The only
exception was the weather, which was sunny
and warm.
When I landed at Keflavík International
Airport I did not know what to expect, but
it turned out that Iceland surprises you day
after day, even when you spend a whole
month there and even when you find yourself
thinking: “That is it, it cannot get any better,
from now on it will disappoint me”.
It is not possible to describe the magnificence
of Icelandic landscapes. The beauty that
you can find in the middle of nowhere, the
pleasure of reaching a hot river after a couple
of hours of walking and the amazement when
you finally reach the glacier lagoon. And what
about the waterfalls? When you think you
have got used to waterfalls you find a new
astonishing one. And then there are seals,
puffins, seals, whales, seals. Did I talk about
seals? A friend of mine once said they are “the
dogs of the sea” and she totally nailed it.
However, one of the best parts of the whole
thing was the people. The doctors and
Icelandic students I met at the hospital were
always helpful and concerned about our
practice and wanted to make sure we were
learning something. And I found out that
everybody speaks English fluently (the most
surprising thing for an Italian student).
Talking about our contact people I can just say
that they were outstanding. They took such
a good care of us. They planned trips, beer
nights and spent some of their free time with
all of us. And, overall, they gave us the best
advice to survive the extremely expensive life
in Iceland (which, for the sake of brevity, we
will sum up in “Go to Bónus”).
There are two main hospital buildings in
Reykjavík, which we used to label as “the
fancy one” and “the not so fancy one”, even
if both of them are way fancier and better
equipped than most Italian hospitals. I was
in the “not so fancy one” [innskot ritstjórnar:
Landspítalinn í Fossvogi] but nonetheless
I found that everything was functional and
I really appreciated the way everyone in the
department took care of the patients and the
way they felt (seems obvious, but is not).
Ester Bonanno
læknanemi á sjötta ári 2017 - 2018
við Università degli Studi di Perugia
Að vera skiptinemi
á Íslandi
Reynslusaga erlends skiptinema hérlendis