2 Comments

Northern Exposure

  By , ,

Somewhere along the way, Northern Maine changed for me.

I’m not sure if this post is just a story about a surprisingly good assignment or if it’s something deeper about discovering new places. It’s probably not all that deep, but there is a new part of Northern Maine that is A-O-K in my book.

"Katahdin" is a Penobscot Indian term meaning "the greatest mountain." So, technically, to say Mount Katahdin is redundant and silly - "Mount The Greatest Mountain." Anyways, it's much much bigger than anything else around. A shot from our campsite Saturday night.

“Katahdin” is a Penobscot Indian term meaning “the greatest mountain.” So, technically, to say Mount Katahdin is redundant and silly – “Mount The Greatest Mountain.” Anyways, it’s much much bigger than anything else around. A shot from our campsite Saturday night.

The speed limit has recently been increased to 75 mph north of Bangor. As far as I can tell, this stretch of highway is totally unpatrolled, and everybody knows it. I haven’t driven over 90 so much since I was seventeen. Driving this stretch at 80 to 90+ you can get from Bangor to the town of Houlton in just under 2 hours, here the interstate takes a sharp right hand turn into Canada, but getting off onto route 1 will carry you north through the farming towns of Aroostook County, or as it is known around Maine, just “the county.” About 45 minutes up that stretch of Rt 1 is Presque Isle, where Kate and I spent the last 13 weeks on assignment. I don’t know what I really expected to find all the way up in Presque Isle, but it ended up being a good town with great people. Right at the end of July, as we got towards the end of our contract, there was one week that I thought had a little bit of everything from our experience up in the county.

The week started out with the opening of the Northern Maine Fair (nohthen-Maine-Fayah). Anyone who has been to a state or county fair knows what I have gotten myself into: farm animals galore, bigger-than-your-head vegetables, carnival rides, the pinnacle of people watching, and if it can be eaten – it’s gonna be better fried, then eaten. The Northern Maine Fair is something you hear about, but don’t actually know anyone that has gone. The collection of people was… eclectic.

A little different shot I got of Katahdin later Saturday night, again from our campground. Beautiful Northern Maine skies unaltered by lights or pollution.

A little different shot I got of Katahdin later Saturday night, again from our campground. Beautiful Northern Maine skies unaltered by lights or pollution.

My days in the woods continued on Monday when out for my evening run on roads in my neighborhood, I came upon a momma bear and 3 cubs. It really was not that spectacular of a meeting – I surprised her, she definitely surprised me, and we both wanted to get further away from each other. As I back pedaled to put some distance between us, she rounded up her cubs and headed into the woods in a hurry. One cub had gotten away to the wrong side of the road, so I had some fear of continuing on with my run knowing I would have to run between a black bear and her cub. Kate was able to come from town and pick me up after I ran a couple miles in the other direction. Disaster adverted.

On Tuesday, Kate and I celebrated our wedding anniversary by going out to the nicest restaurant in town, Café Sorpresso. I had the seared scallops with maple butternut squash ravioli. Wicked good! I was stuffed to the brim. On the way home we drove up to the high part of town up on a hill where the hospital we were working at is located. We parked by the side of the road to watch the fireworks set off from the fairgrounds before calling it a night and heading on home.

OK, some admissions about this picture. It isn't from this summer. It isn't even from Maine. This is a picture of Kate and I with a group of strangers we met rafting on our first assignment together in Colorado Springs. The guy at 6/7 o'clock in the photo is Adam, he's an actor. He was on NCIS once. He had speaking lines and everything, but by the time I got the show turned on, he was playing a dead guy. Sorry I missed it, Adam. Cool people, fun day.

OK, some admissions about this picture. It isn’t from this summer. It isn’t even from Maine. This is a picture of Kate and I with a group of strangers we met rafting on our first assignment together in Colorado Springs. The guy at 6/7 o’clock in the photo is Adam, he’s an actor. He was on NCIS once. He had speaking lines and everything, but by the time I got the show turned on, he was playing a dead guy. Sorry I missed it, Adam. Cool people, fun day.

We capped off that week the way we did most weeks, off enjoying the great outdoors. We hopped back on the interstate at breakneck speeds and headed south to Millinocket for hiking in Baxter State Park and the best rafting in the East. Baxter State Park is a huge chunk of Maine with Katahdin as its center piece. When hikers are nearing the end of 6 months on the Appalachian Trail, they spend 100 miles in the wilderness without any towns for supplies. They are eventually spit out at the base of a 5,000ft mountain with their finish at the top – that’s Katahdin. We had a nice hike in the area on Saturday, and headed to our tent site to prepare for rafting the Penobscot River the next day. A day on the Penobscot starts with rafting over a 14ft waterfall. The second half of the day contains the Cribworks, an infamous class V rapid. The only picture of our boat in the Cribworks is of the bottom of it. Somehow we all stayed in the boat, but I think a few people had switched seats on the way through the rapid. We were having such a great escape out to the woods, that we decided to put our 2 hour drive back to Presque Isle off until Monday morning before work. At 4 A.M. we packed up our tent and silently slipped out of the campground to head back to work.

I guess that’s it. One week lived in Northern Maine that was representative of the whole experience: A lot of outdoors fun, some country time, some more classy and cultural events, and good work with good people. Now we search on for our next jobs. Where we’re looking has been a pretty rough market, so I don’ know if we’ll be living right where we want, but we’ll find something… and we’ll make the best of it!

No comments

Border Town

  By ,

We’ve been traveling pretty frequently across the border to Canada. It’s real close where we are up here in Presque Isle, Maine.

The first weekend we were here, we just went for a drive in a loop that crossed over into Canada and came back in up at the Northern tip of US Rt 1. Although I grew up with a couple trips to Quebec City being my exposure to Canada, I was surprised how French it is just a few miles from my current home and work. When we drove up to Alaska last spring via Western Canada, English was the only language I heard spoken. We drove through the large city of Calgary, rural areas with a couple Canadian national parks, skied in British Colombia, and camped multiple nights in the Yukon — I don’t think I heard a word of French during that long road trip. Turns out when you walk into a restaurant just across the border here, 30 minutes from where I’m living now, the hostess greets you in French, realizes you’re a little stunned, and then flips the switch over to English. French is the default! Back in high school, I took a lot of French, and Kate took French and grew up with some French speaking in her family. So, we’re not hopeless, but someone speaking Québécois Français at a normal pace totally loses us.

This past weekend, instead of heading northwest with all of the French speaking folk, we headed southwest into New Brunswick. That’s right, southwest. To Canada. SOUTH. We are so hopelessly far North. In the southwest direction, we are back to English speaking Canada. Definitely a lot of French being spoken by other tourists around us in New Brunswick, but all the store clerks went straight to English as the go-to language. It was a cool weekend. We camped with some co-workers on the Bay of Fundy, home to the highest tides in the world. Did a lot of grilling, smores making, and sampling of the local breweries. (Note: When in the New Brunswick Liquor Store, some things while in six packs are priced by the bottle…. if you think you’re getting a good deal on a six-pack, it’s priced by the bottle. YIKES!) On the way home, we stopped by a local winery for some tasting and took a good hike in Fundy National Park. A great weekend in a “foreign” country.

It’s been a pretty good assignment up here. We have quickly reached the ½ way point of the 13 weeks we will be here and time is flying. Time to start looking for the next job and make some licensure decisions. Yuck, hate that part. But, we hope to spend the 4th of July weekend off vacationing on Prince Edward Island. I think P.E.I. is the Cape Cod of Canada… we’ll see!
Enjoy some Canada-centric photography by entering the slideshow below through clicking on anyone of the thumbnails.

No comments

Recycled Emails

  By

I’m always looking for content to put on the page and recently realized that the emails I receive are probably better travel information than the stories I try to tell. So, without further adieu, the second installment of our Q&A.

I like the question that this email asks, The new traveler asked about the finances of travel, and whether there’s really all that much to gain when the expense of travel, furnished apartments, and moving several times per year are all added up. You’ll see my response below, but I’m afraid I downplayed an important point. For me, the extra pay with traveling PT is just a bonus. I do traveling for the adventure, locations, change of pace, and fun of it. Just wanted to be clear. 🙂

Traveler:

Thanks for your last email. I wanted to ask, since you use more than one company for jobs, how do you handle benefits e.g. health insurance, time off etc. I wonder if the higher pay of travel just gets eaten up by not getting a paid vacation, health insurance etc.

Although I am interested in seeing other places, what I most want is to make money to pay off my student loans!

Thanks.

—————————

Hobohealth:

I do carry my own health insurance. From a lot of companies I’m able to get another $1/hr for not needing their insurance. My wife got short-term insurance for a while. At esurance.com you can get insured 6 months at a time. The way to combat having to get your own insurance is to stick with one company – some of them are real sticklers about being back working for them within 14 days between contracts. If you are jumping around between companies like I do and you have a major health issue between assignments, I believe you can retroactively enact COBRA for up to 60 days, so there is that safety net.

You’re right that there are costs to travel – no PTO, moving expenses, etc. I think my wife and I break even compared to working a full-time perm job. But, on the other hand, we take a lot of time off each year. In the last two years I’ve probably taken 15 weeks off. If you are diligent about getting right into a new assignment following the assignment before, there’s a potential to get quite a ways ahead financially…. Another way you can maximize your pay is by actively seeking out the higher paying assignments which are typically in more rural areas and less desirable settings. If you’re a new PT, I’d probably skip seeking out these assignments at first, but later on they can be a great way to make some cash, see some different social/cultural situations, and expand your comfort level on a wider scope of practice.

Hope this helps!!!

————————–

Note: I originally had responded in this email saying COBRA could be enacted 90 days after losing employer sponsored health coverage, the limit is actually 60 days as corrected above. Here is the department of labor’s website of FAQ’s on COBRA. If you jump from recruiter to recruiter without your own insurance, it’s probably really good information for you to know. http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq-consumer-cobra.html

One Comment

Vagabonds, Vagabonds Everywhere

  By
Balloon

Launch site of the first trans-Atlantic balloon flight – Presque Isle, Maine. Jonathan Trappe, who is really cool thinks this is really cool. It must be.

It’s been too long since my last post, so let’s get right into it.

I realized recently that one of the fascinating things about being a Physical Therapist and traveling is all the different people that we get to meet and get to know as we work with them. This thought started when a man showed up at the door of our cabin looking to rent it, because our landlord has left the “For Rent” sign out front. We got to talking about this first TransAtlantic Hot Air Balloon launch site which is just down the road. At this point, the guy introduces himself Jonathan Trappe and whips out his phone to show Kate and I why he finds the balloon memorial so fascinating. “I guess it’s just a small group of us that find that kind of thing really cool. This is my balloon,” he says while showing a picture on his phone of him hooked into a harness attached to a bunch of toy-like latex balloons floating above the clouds. I say to him that it looks like he’s pretty far up. He says, “Yeh, this picture is taken at 20, 000 ft above the Alps!” You gotta check this stuff out ClusterBalloon.com – There’s place down the street that Jonathan might rent. I hope he does, maybe we can be friends.

I don’t know why this came as some sort of revelation to me that I get to meet a lot of people doing what I do – afterall, being able to be a social creature at work is one of the major reasons I got into PT in the first place. Now, I’ve been practicing for 7 years (which through some very rough math works out to 12,000 to 14,000 hours in the clinic), and I can think of a lot of really interesting people that I’ve been fortunate to meet. There’s a couple of patients I’ve treated that opened my eyes to some different and cool stuff. There was this Buddhist monk that would show up for her treatments in her burnt-orange monk robe we’d talk about the different veins of Buddhism. She’d tell me about how she was one of the first female monks in her particular denomination of Buddhism, how it was the most pure of the denominations, and how she brought it to the US several decades back. Just a fascinating woman, I don’t really remember all that much else about her, but she definitely sticks out in my mind as a cool person to have known.

There was this man in his late 80’s I saw for home care a few years back. He opened my eyes to the religion of Spiritualism. He was a leader nationally in the Spiritualist Church where they believe when people die they exist in the same world as us as spirits. To dumb it down: they believe in ghosts. And this guy was a medium who could communicate with the dead. He lived with this much younger roommate who was a tarot card reader. They were always making this soup that I can distinctly remember the smell of – It may have been some sort of mix of the soup and just the particular smell of their place that I remember, it was very distinct. I go over and work with this man a couple times a week. Somewhere inbetween he and the tarot card reader telling me fascinating stories and explaining more about Spiritualism, we’d sneak in a few exercises and some work to improve his mobility. He believed that anyone could be trained to be a medium — that you didn’t particularly need to have a knack for it. Besides this religion that fascinated me, he was just a sharp, open minded guy that I think of occasionally and wish I had kept in touch with. I did think to call him one day, but enough time had passed that I had changed phones and didn’t have his number anymore. Too bad, I’d like to know how he’s doing….. and take him up on that medium session he offered.

"Hey! Look a van with a New Hampshire plate. What are the chances out here in Alaska. On an unrelated note: Brrr, It's cold, glad we're not in a tent...."

“Hey! Look a van with a New Hampshire plate. What are the chances out here in Alaska. On an unrelated note: Brrr, It’s cold, glad we’re not in a tent….”

The travel really increases the amount of people from less-than-ordinary circumstances that pass through my life. When actually out traveling on the road or in airports, I don’t typically go out of my way to chat up people, I’d rather not deal with the inconvenience of them asking me where I live :-), but occasionally someone will creep into the daily interactions and stick as a memory. The only reason cluster-balloon-guy stopped in is because the “For Rent” sign was still up. If we had been well settled into a place for months or years, that sign wouldn’t have been out there and Jonathan wouldn’t have come-a-knocking. “New Hampshire” was the name dubbed to the couple on the Alaskan State Ferry ride to Washington who were driving a big van displaying a New Hampshire license plate and with a big aluminum canoe strapped to the top of the van. We first met them in the line of cars waiting to get onto the first boat out of the Anchorage area. The gentleman of the couple noticed our Maine plates and came strolling over saying something like, “Hey! Maine!? We’re from New Hampshire!” We continued to see this couple everywhere on the 10 day trip down to the lower 48. We saw them on the boat, we saw them out in Juneau on a 2 day stop there, and we even passed them on the highway headed out of Bellingham, Washington. My most amusing memory (of these people whom we never really got to know that well) happened one afternoon on the boat when seas were rough and water was splashing and blowing up over the top of the several story high ship. New Hampshire was hanging out nearby and I remembered they had been tenting out on the deck of the ship. It wasn’t unusual for people to tent on the deck of the ship, but this was getting late in the season and they had the only tent out there in November. The tent was tied to a railing after they were overhead paged on the boat to attend to their tent. According to the ship’s crew, it’s not unusual for winds to whip up, taking unsecured tents weighed down with gear right off the boat into the Gulf of Alaska. I was a little scared to ask them if their tent was out on the deck during this patch of rough seas, but I remember as things calmed a bit and no more water was coming over the top of the ship, Mr. New Hampshire stands up and very matter-of-factually says, “I guess I’ll go see if the tent is still there.” What a character, and neat people living a cool life, cracks me up.

Anyways, just because I feel like there’s supposed to be some conclusion here, let me say this: I like meeting people and I think PT and traveling is a nice combination that lets me meet some pretty cool people. We’re trying to buy a second car off Craiglist this week, that’s a process that lends itself to some strange people getting involved… should be fun!

One Comment

Ask James

  By ,

Hey everyone. It’s hit that time of year where April comes around and I realize I haven’t posted in 3 months. Don’t worry, I haven’t been working too hard, just skiing too much. 🙂

I thought one quick way to get back in the blog-habit is to post a recent email conversation I had with a new traveler. I think he was asking the right questions and made the right decisions in the end. Maybe our conversation can help someone else out there who is working on getting into travel PT.

Happy reading and happy travels! I’ll write again soon.

 

New Traveler: My wife and I have ventured out to begin traveling therapy. We left sunny SC and drove 2800 miles to cloudy OR last week. My wife had a for sure job but my opportunity fell through somewhere around Wyoming.

But now I have been contacted by a SNF and they want to offer me a contract directly.

They asked me to name a price and I asked to have time to think it over a while.

I have a little idea of what to say because I know what the travel company is paying my wife. But before I respond to them I am hoping to get some advice from y’all.

Here are my details: This will be my first job; I graduated in December. It’s going to be a 6 month contract. I have no experience in a SNF but I had 2 clinical rotations in outpatient (1 manual focused), 1 acute rotation, and 1 inpatient rotation.

One traveling company recruiter told me I should make 1400 dollars a week if they didn’t cover housing or insurance. I have both through my wife’s job.

Any thoughts?

Thanks

HoboHealth: Awesome to hear you guys are taking the plunge and hitting the road!!!

I have two thoughts. If the SNF job sounds like something you wouldn’t mind doing, then go for it. But if you’d rather be doing something else, then I think holding out another week or two may yield some good results if you’ve been seeing other opportunities in the area come and go. So, make that decision first… Is this really an assignment that’ll be ok for you? (Also, since you haven’t done SNF before, are there other PTs to help guide you? …the more the better.) Do you need another recruiter?

My 2nd thought is that $1400 sounds really low to me. I know therapists that made about $1500 wkly after taxes through an agency on their first assignment after only 6 months PT experience. Figure on top of that (or whatever your wife is making) that the agency is charging another $10-$20 an hour. That’s a lot of bargaining room for you. I would say as a new grad doing an independent contract $1600 is a very acceptable starting place for take home ($40/hr). I think you should aim higher $2000 ($50/hr)? I’ve heard of independent home health contracts going as high as $70/hr. Depends how ballsy you’re feeling…. Doesn’t hurt to ask. Also, just make sure you’re getting what perks and reimbursements you can.

Here’s some links in case you haven’t read them already (the second is some sample independent contracts):
The Job Search
Independent Contracts

New Traveler: Gonna give you a quick update. I went in for the interview on Friday and loved the facility as well as the other PTs and PTAs. I decided that it would be a great first job for me as a PT. The managers do a lot of the extra stuff like billing, etc so it will allow me to concentrate on solidifying my eval and treatment skills. As you know it’s quite different being an actual PT than a PT student. No one looking over your shoulder and checking behind you.

It is a unique situation. The clinic is considered an outpatient clinic because it is in a retirement village and serves an independent living community as well as a SNF so I will see a wide variety of patients.

The pay is good. It’s right around what we were discussing. I feel like it’s excellent for a new grad. $42 an hour initially and $48 after a month because I will decline the benefits. I am insured through my wife’s job.

Thanks for sharing the link as well. I used some of the pointers from your blog when negotiating the contract. The whole process went pretty smooth. My wife and I are planning to stay in Oregon for 6 months and then move on. We want to hit up Alaska in the next year. Maybe y’all will still be there and we can get a beer.

Thanks for the help. Hope to stay in touch.

HoboHealth: Thanks for the update. Sounds like a great gig and like you made some good decisions over the past few days!

Good luck and keep in touch when you start working towards AK!

3 Comments

International Travel – Reflection (part 4 of 4)

  By , , ,

Reflections

How could Amy not bust out a move at a time like this!?

How could Amy not bust out a move at a time like this!?

So after all of that, all of the waiting, searching, and more waiting, was it all worth it? Most definitely. We were told by those that have traveled to the Middle East before us that our worldview will change from living and working here, and it no doubt has.

From a Physio perspective, there are so many opportunities, so many ways that I can contribute to the department I am part of, and so many things I can learn from others. I am working with people from over 50 different countries, in 1 hospital. The hospital is world class and offers me all that I am willing to accept. I can formulate a research hypothesis and have the means and staff to assist me in carrying it out. We have top physicians, Physios and speakers from around the world presenting topics to us and consulting with our team to make our hospital a better place. It is quite an amazing to be part of something so unique.

One more shot of Doha from the water a night.

One more shot of Doha from the water at night.

From a personal perspective, we have learned how to adapt to different living conditions and more importantly to different cultures. I have learned that being open, non judgmental and genuinely interested in others has allowed me to create trusting relationships with my patients, coworkers, and friends.

I have learned, most importantly, that people are genuinely nice, despite their class, country or religion and that we are all fighting the same battles. We have met wonderful people from our drivers (yes we all tend to have drivers out here!) to CEO’s, tried new sports (squash), adapted our old sports (“mountain biking” in a flat desert) and had our share of love-hate relationships with everything from traffic, to food, and the eternal sunshine that is Qatar.

I hope these posts have kept you engaged and maybe even gotten some to want to jump on a plane and move abroad tomorrow. Thanks for letting me share my thoughts with you!

~Amy

No comments

International Travel – Sponsorship, Benefits, and Qualifications (part 3)

  By

In the previous post, I discussed the importance of researching locations. In this blog, I’ll share my experience in three big topics to consider when moving abroad – sponsorship, benefits, and education qualifications. Where you will be, either in the US or at your new international home when you are dealing with these topics will depend on your unique situation. My husband was able secure his job from the US, which secured his benefits and sponsorship and also took care of attesting his documents. Because I was in the process of interviewing with my potential company when I moved to Qatar (not to mention learning much of this as I went along!), I took care of these things while here. My suggestion is to do as much as you can from the US!

Exploring the local desert. Beautiful vistas.DesertinaSedanSponsorship and Benefits.

How does sponsorship work in Qatar? Sponsorship is usually required in some form if you are working abroad, and is where the company you are working for vouches for you. If you are not sponsored, you cannot obtain a work visa, and then you are just another tourist. Every country is a bit different on this. Qatar is on the more paternalistic end of the spectrum.
Sponsorship, particularly in Qatar, affects your life in many ways and is somewhat tied into the company’s benefit package. In Qatar, it allows you to get residency, to bring your family over (if you make enough money), to take your driving test (yes as Americans we have to take a test, other European expats do not!), to buy a car, to apply for a job, to sign a lease, to buy alcohol for home consumption, to send your kids to school, to have your kids’ school paid for, to have paid flights home and, most annoyingly, to leave the country. Sponsorship is linked to a lot here.

Given that sponsorship and benefits were closely connected, the questions for the two overlapped. Benefits to consider are housing and car allowances, a furnished apartment or an allowance to buy furniture, relocation assistance, paid flights home, assistance with required documentation (attested diplomas, passport, etc), paid time at the completion of a contract and health insurance locally and at home.

Qualifications.

In the US, just stating your University on your resume is sufficient for proving your college education. Many countries require a firmer confirmation of your education qualifications. This I wish I knew earlier, because finding this information took some time. If you are already in contact with a company, they may assist you in getting your documents in order. For Qatar, I needed my University diplomas and a background check “attested.”

Many companies require that your University Diploma, aka certificate, (as well as any other legal document) be attested by the US State Department and the equivalent department in that country. So how do you do this? Here’s a starting point: http://www.state.gov/m/a/auth/  . It pretty much requires you to send your diploma (or a copy of it) to the State Department, where the Secretary of State (in my case Hilary Clinton) has to sign it. If you know where you are working (in my case Qatar), it can be sent to the country’s embassy in the US for verification, otherwise you bring your US attested copy with you abroad, and get it Attested by that country once there. It is then considered a legal document in that country. An easier way to do this is through a proxy. I used http://authxperts.com – who by the way were awesome! They are costly, but they do all the work for you and quickly. If you are lucky, like my husband, your company will do all of this for you (another important question to ask!).

Amy’s husband Joey kicking it with some new friends Doha-style

Since I was working in healthcare, I needed a background check. This one is more sensitive than the Certificate Attestation. In Qatar, the background check was time sensitive. They did not specify if I needed a state or federal check, even after asking multiple times. So to be safe, I got an FBI background check. You can find information on this here: http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/background-checks/submitting-an-identification-record-request-to-the-fbi . I again used Authexperts to assist me in this process, which took about 8 weeks.

It is also worthwhile to find out if you need your birth certificate, marriage certificate or any medical tests that are required to be attested as well. Again, it will save time and frustration if you are prepared! If you do not know what you will need before you leave the country, it is best to bring along your diplomas, birth certificates, marriage certificates, vaccination record, and fingerprints (needed for background check). This will save your friends and family from searching through stored files and sending sensitive material overseas.

 

No comments

PT International Travel – The Prep Work (part 2)

  By , , , ,

This is part 2 of a series on travel abroad as a working Physical Therapist. For previous posts, click “previous blogs” on the menu at the top of the page.

——-

Whether you are following a significant other somewhere or you are looking to relocate abroad on your own, there are a lot of things you want to consider before and during the transition process. Hopefully my story will help those of you thinking about travel abroad decide to take that leap out of the US and help you figure out how to do it. The process is never ending, but the better prepared you are, the less frustrated you will get!

Souq Waqif, a marketplace and one of the favorite tourist spots in Doha.

Souq Waqif, a marketplace and one of the favorite tourist spots in Doha.

 Like I mentioned in the first post, having a contact may be your greatest advantage in landing a job abroad. Think of a friend or family that lives abroad, a coworker that worked abroad or even someone that knows someone that worked or has contacts abroad. Six degrees of separation may work here! That is generally how most of us foreigners here in Qatar ended up where we are.

Since my husband was the one who took a job that was placing us overseas, I had to do a ton of research on the possible countries – Chile, Australia and Qatar – to see if any of them would be a place I could practice. Unlike many other professions, healthcare workers usually have either the burden of proving their proficiency through re-examination (who wants to take the boards again!) or through verification.

So, before you start packing your bags for some beautiful coastline, there’s a few things you will want to research, and then continue to research throughout the process. I’ll try to keep this as condensed as possible, but here’s some quick links if you don’t want to read all of it.

On the water looking back at Doha

On the water looking back at Doha

Given that we had 3 potential locations we could move to, I started by looking into the culture and the requirements for a PT in each country. A good place to start is the World Federation of Physical Therapy (http://www.wcpt.org). They have contact info for a ton of countries, including websites, emails, phone numbers and addresses. Awesome.

I started by emailing the contact for Chile. The biggest questions I was asking at first were 1. Do they accept a US licensure carte blanc, on a case by case basis, or do they require all international PT’s to take an examination? 2. Is Spanish (or Arabic for Qatar) a requirement or are there hospitals where the primary language among healthcare workers is English? I also checked out Chile’s physiotherapy webpage that I found on www.WCPT.org and googled hospitals in Santiago, Chile. Everything was in Spanish. The email I received from their PT association was in Spanish. Fluency seemed like a must at this point. So for Chile, I waited on proceeding until I had a better idea if we would end up there.

Next was Australia. I started by checking out http://www.physiotherapy.asn.au but also contacted a college professor as well, knowing that she practiced there. In Australia, they evaluate each candidate on a case by case basis, but chances are, an exam was likely. Now, being 6 years out of school, I would want to know that I would be here for at least a few years if I was going to study for another board. Again, further search was put on hold. But I couldn’t help to check out New Zealand, since I was looking in that part of the world. http://www.physioboard.org.nz/index.php?Registration-Overseas-QualifiedPhysiotherapists . Now this is the kind of information I was looking for! Direct information on how to apply as an international PT. Perfect. Now only if we were going there instead!

I saved Qatar for last. This is where we ended up and was probably the most complex process I have ever endured! I began with checking out background information on Qatar which is a moderately liberal/conservative Islamic country in the middle east. We have to be married to live together. I can drive, walk around, and do most things as I would in the US. It is respectful to have my shoulders and knees covered when in public. English is the common language given the hundreds of languages that are spoken here. So it seemed I should be able to transition here with moderate ease.

We then started by asking my husband’s company a ton of questions to find out if I should come over with my husband of if I needed to wait before I made my move. The big questions – sponsorship, benefits and education qualifications. I will get into these topics in the next blog and the details of what I specifically had to do to be eligible to work in Qatar.

No comments

PT International Travel – An Introduction (part 1)

  By , ,

People are ALWAYS asking me about travel abroad. Unfortunately, I have never traveled abroad to work and know very little about it. Recently, a friend, packed up her bags and headed for Qatar where she has now resumed work as a Physical Therapist. She has been kind enough to put some of her experiences to paper and share them with us.

Over the next month or so, we will post several blogs by Amy Sheridan about her experiences finding work abroad and the logistical and cultural obstacles that she has contended with.

Without further a-do, here is an introduction to Amy and we will soon follow-up with the next several pieces.

-James
———————————————

Doha, Qatar largest city. A population of about 1 million.

Doha, Qatar’s largest city. A population of about 1 million.

Ever think of working as a PT abroad? My husband and I had been throwing that idea around for a year or so before a great opportunity arose for him as an engineer in Qatar. We jumped, and I left my physical therapy job in the US and followed him there. Why Qatar? Why work abroad when you can work as a traveling PT in the US? Well, hopefully our tales will give you some background on not only work and play life abroad but also on the process that I had to go through to work in Qatar.

Prior to jumping ship, I worked as a Sports and Ortho PT in a private outpatient clinic in Boston. I had been working there since graduating from Northeastern University in 2006. Having a boss that traveled to the Middle East for 10 or so years to treat athletes actually prepared me to work abroad. I always thought it would be awesome to start traveling with him there. Instead, I ended up here myself.

Amy getting around Qatar via some local transportation.

Amy exploring Qatar via some local transportation.

The number one reason we ended up in Qatar, of all places to relocate to, was contacts. And patience. My husband must have posted his resume on 50 job websites for work all over the world without a single reasonable follow-up (very frustrating, I might add!) before a conversation with a subcontractor led him to a brilliant contact and a job. My job also came from a contact I made 3 years ago at a conference. If that’s not an ad for keeping old business cards, I don’t know what is!

Over the next few blogs, I’ll share the seemingly never ending production of preparing to relocate, the millions of questions we asked before and during the relocation process, securing visas and residency, idiosyncrasies of living in another country, culture shock, and finally what it is like to work in Qatar. I’m hoping that my experience will guide any of you looking into it or in the midst of the process.

-Amy

6 Comments

Alaskan Ferry Trip

  By

Every experienced traveling health care worker should consider an assignment in Alaska. The Alaska Marine Highway (AMHS) has to a part of the travel plans!

DSC_5937

Our first ship, the Kenicott, this was bigger than our second ship, but smaller than our last.

When Kate and I were preparing to head up to Alaska from our annual winter assignment in Colorado, we researched the ferry up to Alaska and missed our window to book tickets. Hoping to travel in late April or Early May, I called to AMHS at the beginning of March, but found all the slots to bring our car along filled up, we knew better on the way back and scheduled several months out. Now is as good a time as any to describe the clientele and lodging on the boats of the AMHS: This is the mode of transport for inter-village travel, retired fisherman, vagabonds, gypsies, hippies, and general rapscallions. So, as a traveling PT, you’ll fit right in.

We stayed in three different types of “state rooms” on our three ferries. The “state rooms” are as small as a 5 foot by 8 foot closet containing a card table that miraculously converts into a bunk bed. The ritzy-er state rooms have their own bathrooms and just a little bit more space.  Now, the regular ol’ rapscallions, they prefer the no-accommodations-version of this ride. All over the boat, people lie out in their sleeping bags, setup tents duct taped to the deck, and generally get by on sleeping where and when they can.

Arriving into Juneau, our first major stop of the trip.

Arriving into Juneau, our first major stop of the trip.

There are 11 ships that cover 3,500 miles of “highway”. The AMHS has been awarded the title of “All-American Road” which apparently is very prestigious among the country’s scenic highways and byways. By all normal standards, the network of ferries serving the coastline of Alaska is just another interstate highway. Many of the towns the AMHS services have no other roads to them and can only be reached by sea or air. Because there are no other ways into these towns, any type of vehicle you can imagine gets driven onto the car deck of the ferry. I drove our over-packed car onto the car deck and saw an Alaska Airlines tarmac vehicle, smaller boats, multiple prison laundry vans, and a bunch of assorted hippy-wagons. …an eclectic group of vehicles for an eclectic group of people.

The Alaska Marine Highway is awesome. I came away from 6 months in Alaska feeling really good about my experience, but also feeling like I had missed some sort of “bush” experience off the beaten path. Anchorage was great, and, as they say, “it’s only 15 minutes from Alaska.” But, there’s a less accessible part of Alaska… the majority of Alaska… that I hadn’t seen yet. Pull out a map sometime, check out exactly how far away Alaska is and how big it is. Alaska is north of much of the Yukon. Alaska is 2 times bigger than Texas. There’s enough coastline in Alaska that at low tide it’s 3 times bigger than Texas. Overlaid on a map of the lower 48, Alaska touches both Disney World AND Disneyland. Alaska is really far away, and Alaska is really big.

A bald eagle grabbing a snack somewhere between Sitka and Ketchikan.

A bald eagle grabbing a snack somewhere between Sitka and Ketchikan.

The trip on the state ferry fulfilled all my needs for exploration and Alaskan solitude. We traveled 10 days on three different boats down the coast of Alaska and through the inner passage past British Columbia. After a rough ride across the gulf of Alaska and a few short stops in small villages, we arrived in Juneau and had a couple days to explore. Having our car with us, we were able to drive around. We enjoyed dinner at a cool little restaurant on Douglas Island which is connected to Juneau by a bridge. We only saw Douglas in the dark, but it apparently is home to a community-run ski resort, seems like a really cool place. Back in Juneau, the next day, we enjoyed an awesome hike in the snow above Mendenhall Glacier, stopped by Alaskan Brewing Company for some samples, and had a shockingly authentic time at the Red Dawg Saloon. At the Red Dawg, we walked in on about a dozen rowdy locals who at the time had their glasses raised in the air for a toast. They welcomed us for a couple beers and talked our ears off…. Funny people, funny place. At 3 AM we got back on the ferry and spent the day cruising down to Sitka, a town of about 8,000 on the Pacific Coast of Southeast Alaska.

We were lucky enough to have a friend in Sitka, who, much like our friend I mentioned in the previous blog, is doing a stint with the Native Corporation Hospitals. Gio has it good. He lives in a picturesque log cabin just out of town and occasionally gets to make some trips out to the bush by small plane to treat patients in secluded Alaskan villages. Gio took us around and gave us the ultimate locals’ tour of Sitka. Two times we went to Whale Park, an area of town with a view out over a cove. Both times we went, like advertised, there was a pod of orcas far out in the water, but diving up and down, spouting water up into the air. We also took a day hike up through the snow for a scenic view of town and it’s volcano on a neighboring island (Mt Edgecombe). To cap it all off, we stopped at Baranoff Island Brewing Company on the way back to the ferry. Great beers – in a small town – on an island – a long way from everything. Who knew?

The last leg of our ferry trip was 3 days with only one quick stop in Ketchikan. We enjoyed a make-shift turkey dinner on Thanksgiving and eventually made it into Bellingham, WA. What a trip. A must do. Put it on the list.

I’ve added some photos below of some of our pictures on the trip. Click on one to open up the gallery. Enjoy!