Average Clinical/Volunteer Hours to get into Medical School

[WDR97]

Hello all, I’m looking for advice on how many clinical hours I should aim for. I recently graduated from undergrad and decided to pursue medicine after a gap year and much thought. I was wondering how many hours of clinical experience pre-med students usually have before getting into medical school. I have some other experiences that I feel may help me stand out but they aren’t related to human medicine. I am currently a COVID-19 screener at a local hospital. I love interacting with patients but I’m looking for a more interesting experience to replace or do in addition to this. I have also considered volunteering at hospitals and pursuing a CNA but have not done this yet. In addition I have some volunteer and community service hours but how many hours should I be aiming for? And what’s the average amount of hours for shadowing? Thanks!

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Bonne Nuit]

In regards to shadowing: shadow 50-80 hours total. Primary care shadowing is seen as a plus at many programs (esp. state schools/primary care-focused schools), so try to get in at least 40 hours shadowing a primary care physician. You can add on shadowing in other specialties, if you want, once you've seen some primary care. Returns diminish as you approach 100 shadowing hours, so don't do any more than that.

In regards to your clinical hours: successful applicants will typically have a bare minimum of about 200 clinical hours (paid and/or volunteer), but I personally think 400+ is a good target. This works out to 4-5 hours per week for about two years and longitudinal experiences > short term volunteering.

I think the COVID screening is a good start, but I agree that you can likely find better clinical experiences. Hospital volunteering is great, so long as they put you in a role that interacts with patients directly (e.g., transport, patient sitter, reading to pediatric patients). It won't count if they're only asking you to help out in the gift shop or file paperwork somewhere. Now, if you're looking to make money and gain clinical experience at the same time, then paid clinical employment (CNA, EMT, MA, phlebotomy, scribing) is absolutely the way to go. Plus, it's much easier to rack up the hours when you're being paid.

In regards to other volunteering: most applicants will have at least a few hundred non-clinical/community service hours, but medical schools have widely varying community service requirements. It's not uncommon to see matriculants with over 1000 community service hours at schools with service missions. But if you're targeting research-focused programs, you might be fine with 150.

 

[WDR97]

In regards to shadowing: shadow 50-80 hours total. Primary care shadowing is seen as a plus at many programs (esp. state schools/primary care-focused schools), so try to get in at least 40 hours shadowing a primary care physician. You can add on shadowing in other specialties, if you want, once you've seen some primary care. Returns diminish as you approach 100 shadowing hours, so don't do any more than that.

In regards to your clinical hours: successful applicants will typically have a bare minimum of about 200 clinical hours (paid and/or volunteer), but I personally think 400+ is a good target. This works out to 4-5 hours per week for about two years and longitudinal experiences > short term volunteering.

I think the COVID screening is a good start, but I agree that you can likely find better clinical experiences. Hospital volunteering is great, so long as they put you in a role that interacts with patients directly (e.g., transport, patient sitter, reading to pediatric patients). It won't count if they're only asking you to help out in the gift shop or file paperwork somewhere. Now, if you're looking to make money and gain clinical experience at the same time, then paid clinical employment (CNA, EMT, MA, phlebotomy, scribing) is absolutely the way to go. Plus, it's much easier to rack up the hours when you're being paid.

In regards to other volunteering: most applicants will have at least a few hundred non-clinical/community service hours, but medical schools have widely varying community service requirements. It's not uncommon to see matriculants with over 1000 community service hours at schools with service missions. But if you're targeting research-focused programs, you might be fine with 150.

Thank you so much for the guidance and advice!

 

[TragicalDrFaust]

Excellent advice above. Also wanted to add it's good to think about how the experiences you're getting fit into your narrative, especially as someone who decided they were interested in medicine a little later. If a secondary essay or interviewer asks you why you did an activity, it's much easier to answer if you have some kind of cohesive reasoning.

 

[WDR97]

Excellent advice above. Also wanted to add it's good to think about how the experiences you're getting fit into your narrative, especially as someone who decided they were interested in medicine a little later. If a secondary essay or interviewer asks you why you did an activity, it's much easier to answer if you have some kind of cohesive reasoning.

Yeah I’m still working on that. I need to try to find a way to explain how working in a hospital and interacting with patients convinced me to switch. And I’m hoping to build better experiences to show my interest in medicine and working with/helping patients only increased from there. I don’t want it to sound too cheesy though.

 

[saiyanstrong117]

Just a tip for while you are doing your clinical volunteer hours, I had somebody tell me to keep a journal about what I felt were big moments to me and how certain events made me feel. When you are talking about these events in your application it really helps to be able to remind yourself exactly why you thought a specific event was so interesting to you or to make sure you don't forget something that might help you later! I personally scribed for about 2 years for family medicine and then an orthopedic surgeon and was able to use the notes I had made in my journal to give specific examples of how the doctors were helping the patients feel heard, important things I learned, etc.

 

[WDR97]

Just a tip for while you are doing your clinical volunteer hours, I had somebody tell me to keep a journal about what I felt were big moments to me and how certain events made me feel. When you are talking about these events in your application it really helps to be able to remind yourself exactly why you thought a specific event was so interesting to you or to make sure you don't forget something that might help you later! I personally scribed for about 2 years for family medicine and then an orthopedic surgeon and was able to use the notes I had made in my journal to give specific examples of how the doctors were helping the patients feel heard, important things I learned, etc.

Great advice! Thank you!