What is the value of a Research Associate to Med Schools?

[RN-2-Medicine]

A local big name hospital has a research associate program opening for post-bacc students.The program is being described as a way for post-bacc students to gain exposure to clinical research amongst attendings/residents/ licensed professionals.

The way I see it -->
pros: Exposure to research, Networking opportunities, Patient interaction
cons: No publications? Requires commitment of 12+ hours a week for two semesters

Just wanted to know... Is this the type of research experience that med schools like to see!? Does this kind of volunteer experience boost a med school application? I want to hear your input.

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[LizzyM]

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What you are describing sounds like a part-time, unpaid, volunteer experience. What is the nature of the "patient interaction"? Do you get to interview and have a mutual selection process with the team or do you get assigned? Are there specific duties or job description?​

I would say that this is not a common type of research experience and it often has little to do with the scientific method or require any bench skills (which med schools seem to like although they are required of very few physicians). Where you have contact with patients/subjects may be debatable and you may be packaging and running samples between buildings, calling people with reminders of up-coming appointments, handling clerical tasks. Check into it carefully and do your due diligence.

 

[wholeheartedly]

A local big name hospital has a research associate program opening for post-bacc students.The program is being described as a way for post-bacc students to gain exposure to clinical research amongst attendings/residents/ licensed professionals.

The way I see it -->
pros: Exposure to research, Networking opportunities, Patient interaction
cons: No publications? Requires commitment of 12+ hours a week for two semesters

Just wanted to know... Is this the type of research experience that med schools like to see!? Does this kind of volunteer experience boost a med school application? I want to hear your input.

There’s probably some variability in how these programs are set up and what you wind up doing.

I actually did one of these programs in the ED and used it for my MPH field experience as well. It was geared towards pre-meds (and a few pre-PAs, and the occasional person looking for clinical research experience)

The program I did was competitive and structured. The research associates completed CITI training for human subjects research, additional clinical research content, got training on the background of each of the studies being done, training on how to screen patients, consent patients, collect data, and perform chart reviews for about 12 studies being conducted at the times. Data collection ranged from doing observations, timing things, checking O2 Sats, and other vitals, etc. Additionally we got to observe a ton of patient care. We also got to attend the weekly dept case conference. Some research associates got pulled by residents or attendings to observe other things (a couple got taken up to see the burn unit). As far as publications go, the research associate group was thanked in papers, although a few who stayed longer did more in depth projects and did get their names on pubs.

The local medical school did view this experience positively and it was highly recommended by med students who had done it. I had really enjoyed my experience and am glad I did it. Some people realized medicine wasn’t for them afterwards.

On the other hand, if your experience winds up being like @LizzyM mentions with minimal actual patient exposure or opportunity to observe physicians and care teams and is more like the clinical research equivalent of the lab dishwasher, then you might want to look elsewhere.

Try to talk to people who’ve done it and see what they did and got out of it, preferably someone who got into med school.

 

[RN-2-Medicine]

.

What you are describing sounds like a part-time, unpaid, volunteer experience. What is the nature of the "patient interaction"? Do you get to interview and have a mutual selection process with the team or do you get assigned? Are there specific duties or job description?​

I would say that this is not a common type of research experience and it often has little to do with the scientific method or require any bench skills (which med schools seem to like although they are required of very few physicians). Where you have contact with patients/subjects may be debatable and you may be packaging and running samples between buildings, calling people with reminders of up-coming appointments, handling clerical tasks. Check into it carefully and do your due diligence.

Well I haven't heard a response from them so this opportunity is up in the air