Clinical Research Experience- what is it? how can I get it? Is it important

[omegaz]

I am a biology major so I have plenty of biology research experience. I also have a good amount of hospital volunteering experience. So is clinical research really that important when I have enough biology research experience? If so, how should I get it?

Thanks!

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[stkjhu]

If you have enough clinical and research experience I really don't think it's necessary. For me, I used my clinical research as clinical experience and I wanted to see how clinical research was done. If you're interested in clinical research (looking at things like if surgery or surveillance of aortic aneurysms is better), then getting involved in it wouldn't hurt.

If you want to get involved, look up the kinds of research doctors, see if anything appeals to you, then email those doctors.

 

[LizzyM]

I am a biology major so I have plenty of biology research experience. I also have a good amount of hospital volunteering experience. So is clinical research really that important when I have enough biology research experience? If so, how should I get it?

Thanks!

Medical school, or even residency, is soon enough to get clinical research experience. Most of what you can do at this point in your career is the bench science equivalent of washing glassware. It wouldn't be bad as a full-time job during a gap year but casual, part-time is hard to find and is mostly paperwork (filing, data entry, correspondence with regulators). It is very unusual to have a college student developing and testing hypotheses or even trouble-shooting a part of the protocol that is not working.

 

[survivordo]

It sounds like you already have a good combination of clinical and bench research experience, I wouldn't fret about having any additional research experience that is specifically clinically oriented. If it is something you are interested in and the opportunity knocks then go for it, but I don't think it is going to make the difference between a medical school acceptance and rejection at this point.

Survivor DO