clinical research = clinical experience?

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sit down lucy

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A bit of background:

I spent about 8 months working on a sleep study. It would be just me and the patients for however long my shift was. I ran all of the tests, attached all of the wires, etc etc. It taught me a great deal about how to handle uncomfortable, sleep-deprived people, which from my other shadowing experience seems to come in handy when dealing with actual patients. I've heard other people refer to similar clinical research experience as actual clinical experience, but I've always thought of it as research experience... I was wondering if all of you fine people on SDN had similar experiences or thoughts on this. Does clinical research experience "count" as clinical experience?

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sit down lucy said:
Does clinical research experience "count" as clinical experience?

I know someone who only had clinical research and was explicity told by multiple interviewers "no, clinical research does not get counted as clinical experience" regardless of the patient contact (which was extensive) or breadth of experience. So at least some schools only count it as research. Thus I wouldn't rely on it as your only oar in the water. Do some volunteering/shadowing on top of that and you will be fine.
 
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Law2Doc said:
I know someone who only had clinical research and was explicity told by multiple interviewers "no, clinical research does not get counted as clinical experience" regardless of the patient contact (which was extensive) or breadth of experience. So at least some schools only count it as research. Thus I wouldn't rely on it as your only oar in the water. Do some volunteering/shadowing on top of that and you will be fine.

I have about 60 hours of shadowing, and I've just started volunteering as well. I'm really really research heavy other than that, so I was wondering if that helps my case (eg, gets people to stop asking me why I don't just get a PhD). Sounds like it doesn't. :thumbdown: Ah well.
 
I think it counts, but there are different levels of things that admissions committees want.

At least at my school's med school this is what they told us.......

They want to see volunteerism preferably some of which is in a clinical setting because it shows both clinical exposure and committment to serve others.

They want to see Shadowing because it shows that you've seen real world medicine vs. those unrealistic people who have no clue about the differences from real world medicine vs. ER.

Research depending on where you are planning on going to, top 10 vs. state school not so high in rankings, is relative. If you want to go to a big name school, then research is important but at a school like our state school, it is not too important.

In terms of clinical research it shows your exposure to medicine, but it doesn't tell anything about your committment to service of others as volunteerism does and it doesn't show clinical shadowing of a typical doctor so much as it shows how an academic physician operates.

That said, the best place to get a good second opinion is to talk to admissions directors or ask REL or LizzyM to comment on this since they are adcom people on SDN.
 
Law2Doc said:
I know someone who only had clinical research and was explicity told by multiple interviewers "no, clinical research does not get counted as clinical experience" regardless of the patient contact (which was extensive) or breadth of experience. So at least some schools only count it as research. Thus I wouldn't rely on it as your only oar in the water. Do some volunteering/shadowing on top of that and you will be fine.

I think I'd have to agree with this. Prolly depend on the school, and i'd do some extra volunteering/shadowing. It never hurts to do more when you have time. Especially the volunteering stuff. If i recall, research is the one that is quote optional, while volunteering is quite mandatory (even if its not stated as a pre-req more or less like classes).

I've been doing clinical research since.....2002 or something, and prolly had extensive volunteering/shadowing hours from 2000-2003. I can't even quantify the amount of hours I've been seeing patients for clinical research. BUT, as I learned in these forums (prolly from a reply from Law2Doc :) ), as well as talking to the director of admissions at our med school here, I should do more recent volunteering/shadowing. Therefore upon completion of my graduate degree, I'm going to volunteer more just to keep things up to date. Thats how important volunteering is relative to doing my PhD which is based on clinical research. Leave them with minimal room to question my application...thats my policy :laugh:
 
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