Adcoms - Is this Bad??

[mafunk]

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Anyone who can share an informed opinion on this please answer. I'm especially interested in hearing from you if you are an adcom. If you are an adcom please say so.

I am working hard to get medical experience as I'm looking at applying to PA and DO schools. PA schools demand experience.

I've been volunteering at a low income community medical clinic for ten months (in triage taking vitals) and at a free medical clinic for six months (as an MA). I have about 256 medically related volunteer hours and if I keep going this way will have only about 400 hours.

However I really need at least 1000 hours minimum. I have applied for several Medical Assistant Jobs (not certified but trained on job). So far I'm getting called from plastic surgeons, hair transplant places, weight loss clinics, and plasma centers. They are offering full time work, formal training, etc.

These things all seem sort of icky to me, but they do offer a great deal of direct patient contact and medical experience. Also what I really want to do once I graduate is to serve the poor. Do you think it would help or hinder my application if I accepted a job at one of these places? I could go to Nepal for two months and get great experience serving the poor, but it kind of scares me, as I've heard some bad stories about Peace Corps missionaries getting raped.

 

[tantacles]

Anyone who can share an informed opinion on this please answer. I'm especially interested in hearing from you if you are an adcom. If you are an adcom please say so.

I am working hard to get medical experience as I'm looking at applying to PA and DO schools. PA schools demand experience.

I've been volunteering at a low income community medical clinic for ten months (in triage taking vitals) and at a free medical clinic for six months (as an MA). I have about 256 medically related volunteer hours and if I keep going this way will have only about 400 hours.

However I really need at least 1000 hours minimum. I have applied for several Medical Assistant Jobs (not certified but trained on job). So far I'm getting called from plastic surgeons, hair transplant places, weight loss clinics, and plasma centers. They are offering full time work, formal training, etc.

These things all seem sort of icky to me, but they do offer a great deal of direct patient contact and medical experience. Also what I really want to do once I graduate is to serve the poor. Do you think it would help or hinder my application if I accepted a job at one of these places? I could go to Nepal for two months and get great experience serving the poor, but it kind of scares me, as I've heard some bad stories about Peace Corps missionaries getting raped.

Since you're only applying to DO schools and PA schools, you may want to post this in the DO forum, as this is the pre-allopathic forum. In any case, why do you need 1,000 hours? That seems like a pretty arbitrary number.

 

[CursedtoFirst45]

Since you're only applying to DO schools and PA schools, you may want to post this in the DO forum, as this is the pre-allopathic forum. In any case, why do you need 1,000 hours? That seems like a pretty arbitrary number.

I believe that's the magic number to get to for PA schools if I recall correctly

 

[Green Grass]

I'm an M4 on the admissions committee for an MD school, and I can tell you that if you get to 400 volunteer hours, it would be above average and it would be noted on your application.

Now, regarding your work status to increase your clinical hours, I think this is a great idea. I would recommend the plastic surgery or weight loss centers over the hair transplant or plasma centers. Other schools or Adcom members might not agree with me, so see this as just one person's opinion.

Good luck.

 

[tpraolm]

My girlfriend got accepted to 2 top ranked PA programs with no medically related experience or volunteer experience of any kind. I don't know which schools you've been researching but I would say it isn't entirely necessary.

 

[Catalystik]

Anyone who can share an informed opinion on this please answer. I'm especially interested in hearing from you if you are an adcom. If you are an adcom please say so.

I am working hard to get medical experience as I'm looking at applying to PA and DO schools. PA schools demand experience.

I've been volunteering at a low income community medical clinic for ten months (in triage taking vitals) and at a free medical clinic for six months (as an MA). I have about 256 medically related volunteer hours and if I keep going this way will have only about 400 hours.

However I really need at least 1000 hours minimum. I have applied for several Medical Assistant Jobs (not certified but trained on job). So far I'm getting called from plastic surgeons, hair transplant places, weight loss clinics, and plasma centers. They are offering full time work, formal training, etc.

These things all seem sort of icky to me, but they do offer a great deal of direct patient contact and medical experience. Also what I really want to do once I graduate is to serve the poor. Do you think it would help or hinder my application if I accepted a job at one of these places? I could go to Nepal for two months and get great experience serving the poor, but it kind of scares me, as I've heard some bad stories about Peace Corps missionaries getting raped.

In my state, PA schools require 2000 hours of patient experience, so obviously there is a lot of variation depending on the school you'd like to attend.

The weight loss clinic sounds like the best of the options presented for paid work, provided you'd interact with patients rather than a file cabinet.

For DO schools, 400 hours gained over at least a year is likely to be fine.

 

[LizzyM]

Just to put it in perspective, 1000 hours is 6 months of full time employment.

I'd go with the plastic surgeon as I think it offers the greatest variety. Not sure about hair transplant & weight loss clinics; plasma centers will give you the most exposure to the poor (because that's the group most likely to sell their plasma) but the work is likely to be limited to blood bank sorts of things (history and mini-physical, venipuncture).

Two summers of full time work (10 wks per summer, 40 hrs/wk) and what you've done to date will put you over the top.