Clinical Exchange in Japan

My elective in Nagoya was fantastic – the experience was both informative from a medical perspective, and extremely enjoyable overall, and I have nothing but good things to say it. To start with, setting up my placement was very straightforward thanks to the helpful staff at the Office of International Affairs at the medical school – they always responded to any queries I had promptly, and knowing that I had their support at all times really helped to put me at ease. Furthermore, the accommodation provided by the university was superb – it was very affordable but very high quality and modern, which really helped me to settle in easily.

I can safely say that I was well taken care of during my actual rotations too – right from the start of my placement I was blown away by the kindness and hospitality shown to me, a very pleasant cultural experience! I quickly learnt that there is a strong team dynamic in Japanese medicine, and was always made to feel valued and included in that team: Staff continually went out of the way to provide teaching in English for me, and took a genuine interest in me which I really appreciated. I even got invited to the haematology department’s Summer party, which was a definite highlight of my trip. All of this really helped me to get a good experience of Japanese culture, which is very interesting in its own right, and something that was very important for me to get out of this visit. I learned some basic Japanese before I went which I found very helpful to make a good impression, get deeper into the Japanese culture and to show respect to patients. This visit has definitely inspired me to keep up with my Japanese studies!

The placements were efficiently organised too. I was given a timetable for each day in my departments, but there was plenty of flexibility if there was something I wanted to particularly see. I was exposed to plenty of different areas in both departments, such as professor rounds, patients on the wards, clinics, surgery, research activities and departmental meetings. Some highlights were getting the chance to see stem cell transplant procedures during my haematology placement, learn about some of the new drugs available in Japan to treat diabetes, and It was particularly good to follow the same patients over the course of the rotations to see how they progressed. I was also able to give a presentation to Japanese medical students on my experience to encourage them to seek training abroad. From this wide breadth of experiences and being able to easily approach doctors and ask questions, I feel that I gained a good understanding of the Japanese health care system, and I enjoyed comparing it to the one used by the UK.

There was plenty of time to enjoy Japan outside of the hospital too. I fell in love with Nagoya: Although it’s the 4th most populous city in Japan, and definitely has that big city vibe, the easy to use subway system makes it feel wonderfully compact, and everywhere feels within reach. It’s also relatively unpopular with tourists which is a definite plus after visiting more popular cities such as Tokyo which is full of them! There is plenty to do in Nagoya, with lots of interesting neighbourhoods to explore, and more than enough shopping, sightseeing, bars and restaurants to keep you occupied for 4 weeks. Nagoya has some excellent cuisine with characteristic rich, strong flavours, and I made sure to try nearly all of it. I would strongly advise anyone visiting to eat misokatsu. That’s not to mention that there are plenty of great places to visit nearby; I travelled to Shirakawa-go, Takayama and a summer festival in the neighbouring city of Okazaki, with fireworks lasting for 2 hours!

I was very sad to say farewell to the teams that had looked after me so well on my elective. The experience was amazing on an educational and a personal level – I will always look back on it fondly, and I would recommend it to anyone. I will definitely return to Japan in the future.