Can a big spike in an area of an app make up for underperformance in another?

[deleted1080380]

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[Blueprint Med School]

First of all, try to find clinical experiences wherever you can. While adcoms will recognize that it is incredibly difficult to find clinical experiences due to the pandemic, 80 cumulative hours including shadowing is definitely on the low side and will cause some schools to turn away from your application. Some schools may be more lenient and recognize how you stand out elsewhere. Based on what you've described, what you've done will definitely make you stand out but there will definitely still be a few schools who will focus on the low clinical hours.

Kevin W, MCAT Tutor
Med School Tutors

 

[datboi_58]

IMO, what you absolutely need is 40-50 hours of shadowing (likely in some sort of primary care setting) or something similar where you see what the physician does. Not having this is a big red flag because schools think you don't know what you're getting into.

Next, it is important to have clinical experience with patients or healthcare staff so this can be volunteering, being an medical assistant, etc. While this is important as well, I think schools are more lenient with this if you have another activity that has you doing similar roles. For example, non-clinical volunteering can be a substitute for clinical volunteering or being part of a work team is similar to being an MA working as part of a healthcare team. Obviously it's not the same and there will be some schools that might throw out your application but in my experience, many schools will be understanding.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

IMO, what you absolutely need is 40-50 hours of shadowing (likely in some sort of primary care setting) or something similar where you see what the physician does. Not having this is a big red flag because schools think you don't know what you're getting into.

Next, it is important to have clinical experience with patients or healthcare staff so this can be volunteering, being an medical assistant, etc. While this is important as well, I think schools are more lenient with this if you have another activity that has you doing similar roles. For example, non-clinical volunteering can be a substitute for clinical volunteering or being part of a work team is similar to being an MA working as part of a healthcare team. Obviously it's not the same and there will be some schools that might throw out your application but in my experience, many schools will be understanding.

In the age of covid, schools might be understanding about lower clinical hours. But in general, having a lot of non-clinical volunteering won’t make up for a lack of clinical hours. You need both.

 

[deleted1080380]

Makes sense, thank you. I suppose the question is now how many hours should I get for clinical? To be clear, I have some shadowing (~25 hours in a primary care setting), and my clinical volunteering experience is at the same place I did clinical volunteering in high school, just the college program. I'd rather spend my time doing my business since the impact is incomparable to me running around the ED restocking rooms and passing out magazines in the waiting room...but yeah I guess if I need to do X amount then I must have to, I wouldn't want to submit an application that would immediately be flagged.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Makes sense, thank you. I suppose the question is now how many hours should I get for clinical? To be clear, I have some shadowing (~25 hours in a primary care setting), and my clinical volunteering experience is at the same place I did clinical volunteering in high school, just the college program. I'd rather spend my time doing my business since the impact is incomparable to me running around the ED restocking rooms and passing out magazines in the waiting room...but yeah I guess if I need to do X amount then I must have to, I wouldn't want to submit an application that would immediately be flagged.

You need to do clinical experience because you need to show adcoms (and yourself) that you know what it’s like to work with sick people and that you want to do it. It’s not just a box to check.

 

[deleted1080380]

You need to do clinical experience because you need to show adcoms (and yourself) that you know what it’s like to work with sick people and that you want to do it. It’s not just a box to check.

Well it certainly does feel like a box to check at this point given the fact that I had over a thousand hours of clinical volunteering in high school and the only reason I decided to pursue pre-med was that I enjoyed the latter. As I said, I still enjoy it, I just feel sour knowing my time could be spent elsewhere (for more impact, still relating to health) and instead I have to grind out to some arbitrary benchmark hour number so my application doesn't get insta denied. Do you know how much time I should be spending in a clinical setting before applying? Or would shadowing be more important at this point?

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Well it certainly does feel like a box to check at this point given the fact that I had over a thousand hours of clinical volunteering in high school and the only reason I decided to pursue pre-med was becuase I enjoyed the latter. As I said, I still enjoy it, I just feel sour knowing my time could be spent elsewhere (for more impact, still relating to health) and instead I have to grind out to some arbitrary benchmark hours number restocking in the ED so my application doesn't get insta denied.

If you continued your clinical volunteering into college, you can count all those hours. You will be fine then. The general consensus is to only include things since HS graduation, but something like 1,000+ hours of volunteering, especially if even a little of it was after graduation, is something you can totally list.

 

[deleted1080380]

If you continued your clinical volunteering into college, you can count all those hours. You will be fine then.

Well I didn't continue in the same program, its different completely, just in the same hospital. Also I took a break freshman year to get my collegiate academics sorted out and clubs/research.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Well I didn't continue in the same program, its different completely, just in the same hospital. Also I took a break freshman year to get my collegiate academics sorted out and clubs/research.

I still think it’s fine. I’m not an adcom but I think most would say you’re more than fine there since you have way more than most applicants.

 

[deleted1025488]

I still think it’s fine. I’m not an adcom but I think most would say you’re more than fine there since you have way more than most applicants.

Wouldn't this just be a situation where they could put it in the additional info section? If they took a break from high school and only started again in freshman year in a different program but listed 1000 hours from then until now that would be...interesting I guess. I think a lot of us premeds have significant high school clinical experience.

Plus, you have 90 now, so it's not like you have zero, so you can still confidently put it on your app, and hopefully, you'll get another chance before may/june to volunteer. Then you could list the college activity as a real activity and if needed just note your previous experience in hs on the additional info. Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Wouldn't this just be a situation where they could put it in the additional info section? If they took a break from high school and only started again in freshman year in a different program but listed 1000 hours from then until now that would be...interesting I guess. I think a lot of us premeds have significant high school clinical experience.

Plus, you have 90 now, so it's not like you have zero, so you can still confidently put it on your app, and hopefully, you'll get another chance before may/june to volunteer. Then you could list the college activity as a real activity and if needed just note your previous experience in hs on the additional info. Correct me if I'm wrong.

You can list multiple time frames for the same experience in amcas. I would definitely still list all those hours. 1090 looks way better than 90, even if most of them are from high school. Most people do not have significant clinical volunteering hours from high school. The average total clinical hours amount is like 100-200.