Activity, bustle, hundreds of people from one place to another and reviewing notes at the last minute in the Guajara Campus. The atmosphere prior to an exam, including more or less hidden nerves, on an unusual day like Saturday. 450 graduates in seven majors, many accompanied by family or friends, took the test that allows them to specialize. Two o’clock in the afternoon on Saturday, January 20. The doors of the Faculty of Economics of the University of La Laguna (ULL) They open at the exact time for the access of approximately 450 applicants –of the 564 registered in the province of Tenerife (596 in Las Palmas)– to the tests of Specialized Health Training (FSE) in seven races. The exam begins at 3:00 p.m. after the identity of each opponent is verified. This now traditional annual academic court is known for the acronym MIR (Interim Resident Doctors) because the majority of graduates opt for a specialty in Medicine (321 places) that requires them to reside for four years in a hospital. But there are also those in Nursing (90 places), the so-called EIR (two years); Pharmacy (16); Psychology (4); Physics (4); Chemistry (1) and Biology (1).
The hundreds of graduates, more numerous than them, are ordered by a security guard to move three meters away from the main entrance. Then, one of the officials collaborating in the organization of the exam – center delegates, auditors and members of the exam tables or members of the seven specific qualifying commissions – warns: «Only opponents; relatives, no. People are accompanied by their loved ones to receive encouragement or share confidences. After all, there are many hopes and hopes for life on this special day. The Health worker tries to reassure with “everyone will come in.” Despite this, when they receive permission, the students, now again, even though they are already graduates, flock to the hall. There is a desire to finish soon although a few hours await. The Guajara Campus, at least in the surroundings of the Faculty of Economics, Business and Tourism, its official name (everything is official here) presents a lot of bustle and unusual activity on the weekend. On the stairs the notes are reviewed – it is true that in isolated cases – and many are already crowding at the entrance to the test venue half an hour before schedule.
Palestine, take 1
Two young people, a boy and a girl, get out of a car and head towards the stairs that lead to their destination. They are not a couple and in fact they just met. They are united by the MIR test. She wears a striking white t-shirt with the slogan Free Palestine and in the background. the flag of the country without current status in recent months. Her name is Elizabeh Bursch Nchama, she is 25 years old, she was born in Equatorial Guinea, lived in Asturias and now resides in Tenerife. She wants to access Pathological Anatomy and says she has studied it “halfway.” She claims not to be nervous but appears to be a little nervous. If she succeeds, she plans to do residency on the Peninsula. Next to her, Víctor García Díaz, 27 years old, a peninsular who was left at the door by a roommate accompanied by Elizabeth. He has not studied “anything” and is not nervous “because this is not my MIR, I take it as preparation for next year.” He was a resident at the HUC in the specialty of Urology for a time but left because “it was not my thing” and he wants to enter Radiology. In principle she plans to do it in Oviedo.
In first person
Marta Cámara Suárez, 27 years old, from Santa Cruz. She does confess to being “very nervous” and claims to have studied “a lot.” She is willing to do her residency on the Island and she would like Psychiatry among the medical specialties. She values the subject more than the place to spend the four years required by law in Escaña. Diego Rodríguez Fernández, 24 years old and also resident in the capital, arrives from the nearby tram stop. If he can choose, he would opt for Digestivo and stay in Tenerife (HUC or La Candelaria). Next to him, his friend Irene Rodríguez Fernández (25 years old, just turned January 1). She has studied as much as humanly possible, she says. His choice is Family Physician; that is, Primary Care. Her friend Carmen Escolá Arteaga, mixes Catalan and Gomera blood at 24 to 25 years old in just nine days. She jokes about where she comes from, perhaps to disguise possible nerves. She denies it because like Víctor García “this is for me the experience prior to what will be my decisive moment, the MIR of 2025. If the flute sounds now, then great, but I don’t think it will happen.” She likes surgical disciplines such as thoracic and in Tenerife “there are very few places or they simply do not exist.” That is why she would have to do her residency outside the Island.
Nurses
Selene Espinosa Delgado is 31 years old, lives in the capital and has been a nurse at the Ofra Health Center (Santa Cruz) for seven years. In this case, she goes to pass the EIR test because her great dream is “to be a midwife.” She explains: “I love children and it seems like a very nice profession that I have always liked.” She explains that she feels nervous and that this state increases “once I’m here.” Nieves Hernández arrives from La Palma – the exam is provincial in nature – and she opts for pure and simple Nursing. In her and Selene’s case, it is a mandatory two years as a resident in a hospital center. She hopes that she can be on her island.
Like father…
Among the relatives of the applicants, a familiar face suddenly appears, that of the prestigious ophthalmologist and former president of the Real Casino de Tenerife, José Alberto Muiños. Together with his wife, he supports Beatriz Muiños Tabares de Nava, 26 years old, who follows in the footsteps of her mother and intends to specialize in ophthalmology. “It won’t be easy because there are only 220 places in the entire state,” says the father. But he then maintains that “you have to be with her and try to achieve her.”
Palestine, take 2
All opponents are received with exquisite kindness by Walid (sweetness in Arabic) Zerené Acosta. He offers a folder of the specialized CTO company to MIR or EIR applicants in which interested parties can consult data and access the address of the Medicine web pages. grupocto.es/postmir and Nursing. grupocto.es/posteir. In them you have the possibility of accessing, starting at four in the morning today, the exam notes. Sweet as her name suggests, Walid reveals that her grandfather was Palestinian and that’s why they called her that. Her mother, from Tacoronte. To be clear.
More offer than ever
Two out of every five Canarians who take the Specialized Health Training (FSE) tests will have the opportunity to do residency on the Islands. There are 437 places offered for 1,157 graduates (11,607 and 30,000, respectively at the national level). The rest will have to find a place in other hospitals in Spain or try their luck next year. The supply increased by 3.3% in the last year and 12% compared to before the coronavirus pandemic. The motto of these kids, most of them girls, would be, with the family reference: “Mom, I want to be a doctor.” Specialist doctor, it is understood.
