Any issues including these shadowing hours?

[seanm028]

About two years ago my employer sent me to a critical care paramedic training program in a major "medical city" in the US. For about one month I rotated through observational shifts in various departments at two large hospitals. It was a fantastic training opportunity, and helped to solidify my decision to pursue medicine at a time when I was really on the fence. It was a relatively new program at the time, which had its pros and its cons.

Pro: It being a new program, many of the faculty weren't yet sure what our exact role was supposed to be, so most of them aired on the side of liberal inclusion. We got pimped on rounds, assisted in the OR, intubated in the trauma bays, etc. We were all licensed paramedics and stuck within our scopes of practice, so it was nothing under the table or anything like that.

Con: being students in a brand new program at academic hospitals with dozens of other students at all levels of training, we were often in the background. We had to be pretty assertive to get the experiences I listed above. Some of the faculty were great about getting to know each of us, but most weren't so personal. On top of that, our program schedule had us constantly moving around, sometimes only spending a few hours in any given department. I'm relatively confident that most of the attendings who supervised us would not remember us now. I don't even have all of the physicians' names because, like I said, there were times when we were in and out of a department in just a few hours with no proper introductions. So that brings me to my question:

Does anyone see any potential issues with me listing these hours? It was about 135 hours in all. I have about 90 hours outside of this experience with plans to get more, so I'm not super worried about losing the hours. I want to include them because they were a major factor in me deciding to pursue medical school. However, I'm concerned that the lack of verification might be a potential red flag. I know it's uncommon for medical schools to verify these hours, but if they did, I don't think the physicians would remember me specifically. I was a part of a larger program, so hopefully they can at least remember that a group of students rotated through during that time period, but who knows. Thoughts?

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[Catalystik]

About two years ago my employer sent me to a critical care paramedic training program in a major "medical city" in the US. For about one month I rotated through observational shifts in various departments at two large hospitals. It was a fantastic training opportunity, and helped to solidify my decision to pursue medicine at a time when I was really on the fence. It was a relatively new program at the time, which had its pros and its cons.

Pro: It being a new program, many of the faculty weren't yet sure what our exact role was supposed to be, so most of them aired on the side of liberal inclusion. We got pimped on rounds, assisted in the OR, intubated in the trauma bays, etc. We were all licensed paramedics and stuck within our scopes of practice, so it was nothing under the table or anything like that.

Con: being students in a brand new program at academic hospitals with dozens of other students at all levels of training, we were often in the background. We had to be pretty assertive to get the experiences I listed above. Some of the faculty were great about getting to know each of us, but most weren't so personal. On top of that, our program schedule had us constantly moving around, sometimes only spending a few hours in any given department. I'm relatively confident that most of the attendings who supervised us would not remember us now. I don't even have all of the physicians' names because, like I said, there were times when we were in and out of a department in just a few hours with no proper introductions. So that brings me to my question:

1) Does anyone see any potential issues with me listing these hours? It was about 135 hours in all.
2) I have about 90 hours outside of this experience with plans to get more, so I'm not super worried about losing the hours. I want to include them because they were a major factor in me deciding to pursue medical school.
3) However, I'm concerned that the lack of verification might be a potential red flag. I know it's uncommon for medical schools to verify these hours, but if they did, I don't think the physicians would remember me specifically. I was a part of a larger program, so hopefully they can at least remember that a group of students rotated through during that time period, but who knows. Thoughts?

1) No. Go ahead and include them.

2) Hopefully the additional 90 hours includes a primary care doc and some office-based hours so you have knowledge of all the components that make up a physician's day.

3) You don't need to list individual physician names when the shadowing was part of a program for which you were scheduled. Use the program director's name or the office that produced the schedule that you followed. They should be able to attest that you rotated among many staff physicians for about XX hours during the month of ______, 2017 as part of [ YY program]. A backup Contact could be the employer who sent you, who surely had a knowledge of what the program entailed.

 

[seanm028]

1) No. Go ahead and include them.

2) Hopefully the additional 90 hours includes a primary care doc and some office-based hours so you have knowledge of all the components that make up a physician's day.

3) You don't need to list individual physician names when the shadowing was part of a program for which you were scheduled. Use the program director's name or the office that produced the schedule that you followed. They should be able to attest that you rotated among many staff physicians for about XX hours during the month of ______, 2017 as part of [ YY program]. A backup Contact could be the employer who sent you, who surely had a knowledge of what the program entailed.

That sounds like a reasonable approach — thank you for the input!

And yes, the additional 90 hours is mostly office-based, including primary care, IM, and cardiology clinic.

 

[Catalystik]

That sounds like a reasonable approach — thank you for the input!

And yes, the additional 90 hours is mostly office-based, including primary care, IM, and cardiology clinic.

Considering that about 50 shadowing hours are the average listed, you're good to go as you are.