400 hrs Non-Clinical Volunteering - Do More?

[deleted1087654]

Hello. I am slightly non-trad and trying to determine how much to volunteer before applying for med school given past volunteer experiences.

Background: I am 22 years old. I graduated with a degree in Spanish in December. My graduation was delayed because I took medical leave prior to my senior year. During that leave is when I got interested in med school. I started the pre-reqs immediately upon returning, but I still have three semesters of coursework before I can apply. My hope is to apply in summer 2023.

A recent post with comments by Goro and LizzyM gave me the following impression: Three key components of apps are (1) shadowing, (2) clinical experience, and (3) non-clinical volunteering. You should shadow between 50-100 hours. You should have >150 hours in both clinical experience and non-clinical volunteering (>300 hours total). For the latter two components, consistency is equally important as total hours logged.

Between 2017 and 2019, I did >400 hours of non-clinical volunteering. Those hours were spent tutoring disadvantaged students, canvassing for tenant rights, and interpreting for a migrant education program. I did not volunteer in 2020 or 2021 because of pandemic woes, my medical leave/recovery, etc.

I have 25 hours of shadowing and 0 hours of clinical experience. Assuming I have three semesters to bring those hours up, during that time, should I…

• Do another 150 hours of non-clinical volunteering (3-4h/w)?
• Do some non-clinical volunteering (1-2h/w)?
• Ignore non-clinical volunteering to focus on the other categories?
• Take another approach?

I fully believe I can get 150 hours of non-clinical volunteering and meet the minimum recommendations for the other categories. Still, committing 150 hours to non-clinical volunteering will limit the amount of time I can spend in other areas. I also prefer not to rely on projected hours on my app.

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[candbgirl]

Whatever else you do you absolutely need shadowing(including some with a primary care doc) and the clinical experience(paid or volunteer). You need to be face to face with the sick, injured and dying. Those areas must be your focus and if you have time and a passion for some additional nonclinical volunteering, that’s great. But stay away from more tutoring(everyone has that) and focus on helping people unlike yourself . Are you URM? I’m assuming you are but I’m not sure.

 

[deleted1087654]

Whatever else you do you absolutely need shadowing(including some with a primary care doc) and the clinical experience(paid or volunteer). You need to be face to face with the sick, injured and dying. Those areas must be your focus and if you have time and a passion for some additional nonclinical volunteering, that’s great. But stay away from more tutoring(everyone has that) and focus on helping people unlike yourself . Are you URM? I’m assuming you are but I’m not sure.

Thank you for the advice.

I'm planning to shadow a primary care doc throughout this semester, and I'm establishing contact with a dermatologist to shadow with that practice at some point as well. My first 25 hours were with a transplant surgeon, which made sense because I was under the care of a transplant team during my medical leave. The stint got cut short due to COVID.

As for clinical experience, I'm in touch with the three nearest hospitals for jobs/volunteering. One has a No One Dies Alone program that I really hope I can participate in (sitting with, comforting, talking to terminally ill patients). Your comment encourages me to continue pursuing that.

I'm not URM as far as I know. I'm from a rural state and grew up (very) poor. But I'm white, not Hispanic, not disabled, and male. When I got to college I was interested in linguistics, which is why I have a few languages under my belt. (Sadly, Spanish is by far the most practical.)

The stay-away-from-tutoring is good advice. Thank you. If I do make time for non-clinical volunteering, I will ensure it's something less cookie-cutter.

 

[candbgirl]

And be sure to include your Spanish skills on your application. Those skills are widely needed in medicine. Good luck.

 

[deleted1087654]

And be sure to include your Spanish skills on your application. Those skills are widely needed in medicine. Good luck.

Will do. Thanks again!

 

[BeMoConsulting]

Hi there,

Great question. It is true that you will need some clinical hours. I would suggest thinking about which schools you want to apply to, and go to the MSAR (Medical School Admissions Requirement) website to see if your schools have a certain cut off for hours. One thing to mention is that due to the pandemic, many students are getting shadowing hours online. They are able to do case studies and watch or talk to physicians. This may be something to look into as it is a way to ensure you get enough shadowing hours. Other ways to get those clinical hours are scribing or EMT work.

It is important that you are exposed to the field of medicine and that you are able to articulate (in your personal statement, activities sketch, and secondaries) how you are a good fit to medicine. If you have not done so already, we suggest using some sort of spreadsheet to track your activities. You should write the type of activity, the dates active, the hours, a contact person for this position (usually a supervisor) and your responsibilities. Also, leave yourself room to write out any meaningful interactions or experiences you had with patients or colleagues. These will come in handy when you are writing your documents as people are not always able to remember these encounters a year or two later.

I hope this helps.

Best of luck!

 

[LindaAccepted]

Hello. I am slightly non-trad and trying to determine how much to volunteer before applying for med school given past volunteer experiences.

Background: I am 22 years old. I graduated with a degree in Spanish in December. My graduation was delayed because I took medical leave prior to my senior year. During that leave is when I got interested in med school. I started the pre-reqs immediately upon returning, but I still have three semesters of coursework before I can apply. My hope is to apply in summer 2023.

A recent post with comments by Goro and LizzyM gave me the following impression: Three key components of apps are (1) shadowing, (2) clinical experience, and (3) non-clinical volunteering. You should shadow between 50-100 hours. You should have >150 hours in both clinical experience and non-clinical volunteering (>300 hours total). For the latter two components, consistency is equally important as total hours logged.

Between 2017 and 2019, I did >400 hours of non-clinical volunteering. Those hours were spent tutoring disadvantaged students, canvassing for tenant rights, and interpreting for a migrant education program. I did not volunteer in 2020 or 2021 because of pandemic woes, my medical leave/recovery, etc.

I have 25 hours of shadowing and 0 hours of clinical experience. Assuming I have three semesters to bring those hours up, during that time, should I…

• Do another 150 hours of non-clinical volunteering (3-4h/w)?
• Do some non-clinical volunteering (1-2h/w)?
• Ignore non-clinical volunteering to focus on the other categories?
• Take another approach?

I fully believe I can get 150 hours of non-clinical volunteering and meet the minimum recommendations for the other categories. Still, committing 150 hours to non-clinical volunteering will limit the amount of time I can spend in other areas. I also prefer not to rely on projected hours on my app.

While your experience as a patient gave you one kind of insight into medicine, you also need to experience and see more broadly what care providers experience. Your past community service will show medical schools your interest in service. However, both for your apps and for yourself, you need to work/volunteer in a clinical environment. Some more shadowing is also valuable, but not as valuable as hands-on doing. Gaining clinical exposure should be your focus at this time. If you can keep up some non-clinical volunteering (1-2h/w), great, but your priority now should be acquiring clinical exposure.

 

[LizzyM]

Unless the problems you were trying to address by your volunteerism have gone away, or you have moved too far away to continue to be involved with the cause, you should try to devote at least 2 hours/month to some kind of volunteerism, ideally something you've done in the past so that you can show longevity with a cause. The idea is that you want to help people and you do that by volunteering. If you don't want to help people and you are just doing it to check a box, then stopping after you reach a specific number of hours is a clue to your motivation. So, an average of 30 minutes/week (2 hours once a month) and spend the other 167.5 hours/week on the other stuff in your life.

PS: I have a soft spot for "No One Dies Alone". It was a comfort to one of my favorite HS teachers and those who loved her when she was dying (too young) of a neurological condition.

 

[Mr.Smile12]

I'll go with the consensus: focus on getting more clinical exposure (to me shadowing + "clinical experience" should be 150+ hours, not separately). You need to know what the doctor-patient relationship is all about at least. Patient-facing experience is preferred.

I also agree with your non-clinical community service, at the very least if you can commit a few hours a week, you show at least a longevity and interest in working with others in need and how all those needs connect with access or issues with healthcare.

We don't have much information here about your grades or other involvement on campus, so hopefully those are not issues for concern.

 

[deleted1087654]

Hi there,

Great question. It is true that you will need some clinical hours. I would suggest thinking about which schools you want to apply to, and go to the MSAR (Medical School Admissions Requirement) website to see if your schools have a certain cut off for hours. One thing to mention is that due to the pandemic, many students are getting shadowing hours online. They are able to do case studies and watch or talk to physicians. This may be something to look into as it is a way to ensure you get enough shadowing hours. Other ways to get those clinical hours are scribing or EMT work.

It is important that you are exposed to the field of medicine and that you are able to articulate (in your personal statement, activities sketch, and secondaries) how you are a good fit to medicine. If you have not done so already, we suggest using some sort of spreadsheet to track your activities. You should write the type of activity, the dates active, the hours, a contact person for this position (usually a supervisor) and your responsibilities. Also, leave yourself room to write out any meaningful interactions or experiences you had with patients or colleagues. These will come in handy when you are writing your documents as people are not always able to remember these encounters a year or two later.

I hope this helps.

Best of luck!

Great advice. I did snag a 2-year pass to MSAR, but I never thought to check for hour cutoffs as you've suggested. Will do.

I'd also like to thank you for reminding me that I've done some online shadowing, too. Reading conflicting opinions on the validity of that strategy for acquiring shadowing made me back off, but it'd be silly to not include it in my log sheet. I have been tracking my experience in a notebook and a digital spreadsheet.

Thank you very much!

 

[deleted1087654]

While your experience as a patient gave you one kind of insight into medicine, you also need to experience and see more broadly what care providers experience. Your past community service will show medical schools your interest in service. However, both for your apps and for yourself, you need to work/volunteer in a clinical environment. Some more shadowing is also valuable, but not as valuable as hands-on doing. Gaining clinical exposure should be your focus at this time. If you can keep up some non-clinical volunteering (1-2h/w), great, but your priority now should be acquiring clinical exposure.

Thank you for the response. It does look like your opinion is the general consensus. I'll be sure to adopt this approach.

 

[deleted1087654]

Unless the problems you were trying to address by your volunteerism have gone away, or you have moved too far away to continue to be involved with the cause, you should try to devote at least 2 hours/month to some kind of volunteerism, ideally something you've done in the past so that you can show longevity with a cause. The idea is that you want to help people and you do that by volunteering. If you don't want to help people and you are just doing it to check a box, then stopping after you reach a specific number of hours is a clue to your motivation. So, an average of 30 minutes/week (2 hours once a month) and spend the other 167.5 hours/week on the other stuff in your life.

PS: I have a soft spot for "No One Dies Alone". It was a comfort to one of my favorite HS teachers and those who loved her when she was dying (too young) of a neurological condition.

Thanks for the advice!

I did unfortunately move across the country post-graduation, but I will take your advice on doing something that shows long-term interest in a specific cause. I am going to try to put myself in a position to continue interpreting, since I think that's the most impactful thing I've done.

And I'm very glad to know that about NODA. Thanks again

 

[deleted1087654]

I'll go with the consensus: focus on getting more clinical exposure (to me shadowing + "clinical experience" should be 150+ hours, not separately). You need to know what the doctor-patient relationship is all about at least. Patient-facing experience is preferred.

I also agree with your non-clinical community service, at the very least if you can commit a few hours a week, you show at least a longevity and interest in working with others in need and how all those needs connect with access or issues with healthcare.

We don't have much information here about your grades or other involvement on campus, so hopefully those are not issues for concern.

Okay, thank you for the differing perspective on minimum hours for shadowing/clinical experience. I'll keep in mind the preference for patient-facing experiences.

Thankfully my grades are fine. I graduated with a 3.9something. My lowest science grade is an A- in Ochem1, but I hope/expect that won't happen again. And I had some good leadership positions my first couple years of college--founded a Speech/Debate team, did student govt., etc.

My goal is just to finish my pre-reqs strong, crush the MCAT, and apply once I have enough hours in everything we're discussing here. Then all I need is one acceptance!

 

[BeMoConsulting]

Great advice. I did snag a 2-year pass to MSAR, but I never thought to check for hour cutoffs as you've suggested. Will do.

I'd also like to thank you for reminding me that I've done some online shadowing, too. Reading conflicting opinions on the validity of that strategy for acquiring shadowing made me back off, but it'd be silly to not include it in my log sheet. I have been tracking my experience in a notebook and a digital spreadsheet.

Thank you very much!

You are very welcome. Good luck with your preparations