Student experiences
What students actually take home.
The clinical hours are the foundation. But ask any returning student what stayed with them and the answer is almost never the caseload alone — it's the patients, the cities, the meals after clinic, the people they met on the train.
From a recent student
Reflections from Milan: splints, lessons, and gratitude.
The first half of my clinical experience in Italy took place in Milan at Ospedale San Giuseppe, and I couldn't have asked for a better start to this journey abroad. My clinical instructor, Silvia Minoia, welcomed me into her practice with warmth, patience, and so much knowledge to share. Every week, she led us through thoughtful lessons on different hand diagnoses, treatment plans, and prognosis considerations. These sessions quickly became something I looked forward to — they helped me grow in confidence and gave me new ways of thinking about patient care.
One of the highlights of my time in Milan was learning to make splints. Splint-making combined creativity with precision, and I loved the way it challenged me to problem-solve while working with my hands. It's a skill I hope to carry with me and continue refining throughout my career.
Beyond the clinical skills, my experience in Milan gave me so much more: a deeper understanding of healthcare in a different country, the chance to learn from an incredibly supportive mentor, and the joy of immersing myself in a new culture while doing what I love.
Notes from Gavinana
"It's just different."
By Carly Sternberg · Gavinana, Tuscany
Before leaving for across the world, my mentor from back home encouraged me to embrace the Italian culture; she told me "It's not good. It's not bad. It's just different." That statement stuck with me. I began a personal list of the little things to remember about Italian culture shortly after I arrived in Italy — the ways in which Italians are Italians and not Americans.
Italians are loud and expressive, and they talk fast — don't mistake passionate conversations for angry ones. They're more open with one another, freer with compliments. Apartments are kept cooler. Dinner is later — apertivo at seven, then antipasto, prima, secondo. Coffee is offered after every meal. Espresso is the default, and if you order one, get ready for some strong coffee.
Roads are narrower, drivers are faster, and you'll pass clothes drying on every balcony. Bidets are everywhere. There are so many dogs. The grocery bill for two people is what one person pays in America. The gas bill is the opposite. None of this is good or bad. It's just different — and that's the part you carry with you.
Weekend rankings
Where weekends took us.
Students get most weekends free, and the trains are good. Past students have written long, opinionated rankings of every place they reached on Friday afternoons — the Dolomites, Cinque Terre, Naples and Pompeii, Rome, Rimini and Riccione, the Apennines and Mount Cimone, Venice, Verona and Lake Garda, Florence and Pisa, Milan, Bologna, Parma. The list keeps getting longer.
The point isn't that every weekend was perfect (the Bologna train station is famously a problem). The point is that the clinical experience and the cultural one are inseparable — and the second one is what students keep talking about a year later.