Can your clinical exp double as shadowing exp?

[etp123]

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A while ago I completed a great internship that had us work alongside nurses, physicians, and other allied health professionals in a hospital setting rotating through different departments every few months. During my shifts I would help with basic patient care such as vitals, bathing, changing, feeding, and assisting the staff with anything else as needed. After I was finished with my daily tasks, I was able to follow and observe physicians as they did their rounds, visited with patients, and even perform procedures. Some of my most meaningful experiences came from being able to speak with these doctors and see how they planned then performed their work.

Now for AMCAS technically I think this internship counts as "Community Service/Volunteer - Medical/Clinical" as per the internship's description, but am I able to list this activity again under "Physician Shadowing/Clinical Observation" with the relevant hours for how much I shadowed? For instance, I completed about ~500 hrs with this internship but ~100 of those hours were physician shadowing. So, could I list this internship as ~400 hrs "Community Service/Volunteer - Medical/Clinical" and then as a separate activity ~100 hrs "Physician Shadowing/Clinical Observation"?

I'm a bit worried because on my time sheets there is no designation for how many hours are spent doing the normal tasks of your shift vs shadowing, so that would be hard to verify. A solution could be that I ask the program to send a letter confirming that it is common practice for interns to shadow physicians on their shifts.

Or is this not allowed at all and I must seek an entirely different experience focused solely on shadowing?

 

[crazymedguy123]

I may be wrong, but I don't see a big deal with this. I don't think any medical school is going to ask for your timesheets, and if it is common practice, then it's not different than you obtaining a volunteer position at the hospital and asking those same physicians to shadow outside of your structured volunteer time. I would probably list it as the 400-100 split instead of 500. However, as this was a hospital setting, you probably still should seek out experience shadowing in a primary care setting.

 

[freedoctor17]

I think you're fine splitting it. And crazymedguy they could have shadowed a primary care doctor in the hospital... The primary care doctor I shadowed worked in a large academic hospital.

 

[ciestar]

You can absolutely get multiple experiences within one activity. You don’t need a letter confirming anything, that is overkill.

 

[Catalystik]

A while ago I completed a great internship
- I would help with basic patient care
-After I was finished with my daily tasks, I was able to follow and observe physicians as they did their rounds, visited with patients, and even perform procedures.

1) So, could I list this internship as ~400 hrs "Community Service/Volunteer - Medical/Clinical" and then as a separate activity ~100 hrs "Physician Shadowing/Clinical Observation"?

I'm a bit worried because on my time sheets there is no designation for how many hours are spent doing the normal tasks of your shift vs shadowing, so that would be hard to verify. A solution could be that I ask the program to send a letter confirming that it is common practice for interns to shadow physicians on their shifts.

2) Or is this not allowed at all and I must seek an entirely different experience focused solely on shadowing?

1) Yes. That's exactly what you need to do in order to be sure that the shadowing component won't be missed. You will use the same Contact (perhaps the program coordinator) to verify both experiences.

2) The only deficit I see is that you might not have shadowed a primary care doc during office hours in order to get a view of longitudinal care. If you decide to do some, (say, 8-10 hours) you can include it in the same space with the internship-related shadowing.

 

[etp123]

1) Yes. That's exactly what you need to do in order to be sure that the shadowing component won't be missed. You will use the same Contact (perhaps the program coordinator) to verify both experiences.

2) The only deficit I see is that you might not have shadowed a primary care doc during office hours in order to get a view of longitudinal care. If you decide to do some, (say, 8-10 hours) you can include it in the same space with the internship-related shadowing.

That's a relief! Although you are correct in that I did not get to observe a primary care physician. In that case I will work on finding some in my local area to shadow. The closest thing I experienced to observing longitudinal care were the physicians on the geriatrics unit who would supervise their patients for a few months until they were released into hospice care.

 

[ClimbsRox]

Active experience working alongside physicians in a clinical setting >> shadowing a physician. Don't overthink things. Source: Every adcom member I have ever talked to. Also, I have 12 interview invites with like 10 hours of true shadowing in my application, but 120 hours of clinical volunteering that allowed me to observe in the ER.