Confusing situation on hospital volunteering. Please help!

[Medigal]

I am currently a sophomore in Arizona and I started volunteering at a local hospital near my campus in the spring of my freshman year. I started out in January 2019 and continued until March 2019 for the Patient Care Unit position. The hospital used to use volgistics for tracking hours and signing up for shifts. My volunteer coordinator left the position in April and I could no longer sign-up for my shifts. I tried contacting the hospital during the summer after my freshman year and no one got back to me so I applied to other hospitals around and got a position but it was only the front desk so I declined. Meanwhile, a new volunteer coordinator got hired in august 2019 at the previous hospital and I finally was able to contact her. I explained my situation and she assured me that I will not lose my hours from spring. The problem is she has replaced the volunteer hour tracking system and the past hours are now in an excel sheet. She is also less flexible with hours which means I have to wake up early to volunteer but at the front desk. The other positions are almost non-existent or odd hours as one location of the hospital got shut down. So I did not end up volunteering until November 2019 till present.

I recently asked the coordinator for an LOR for my application to the honors program at my university and she denied, saying that I barely have 17 hours when in fact I have volunteered more than that. At first, I was not told that I need to log-in to the new portal so I just used to notify my volunteer lead about my attendance and then I asked the coordinator about the log-in information which she rudely gave me and said that she already covered that in the orientation (which she did not). Thankfully, I have the LORs for the honors application due to my professors from last year who agreed to provide me. But now I'm in a dilemma; I believe I will have a hard time justifying my volunteer hours to medical school if they end up contacting the hospital. I do not want to lose my hard work from previous months and I don't know what's going to happen moving forward.

If I apply to another hospital, I would still have to put the current hospital on the med school app which will show fewer hours and would be a sign of not being committed enough. If I don't put this volunteer work, it would just show that I did nothing during my freshman year besides studying. If I do continue with this hospital, I will be stuck in a non-rewarding position and maybe this coordinator won't support me. I'm afraid she would say something to the medical school that may hurt my chances.

I also volunteer with an outreach program that is affiliated with my university and also with my top-choice medical school. My role there is of a Patient Navigator and we provide medical care to the underserved population. I get to take a medical history, note down vitals, any prescriptions the doctor gives, and record everything in an app and a form. I also take a decisive role as to what kind of care the patient needs based on their concerns and I help them navigate through the process by staying with them the entire time they are at our program. That is definitely a great experience but I would only have about 32 hours of this activity by the time of application and overall 48 hours by the end of senior year as we only volunteer for 2 hours each month for each semester (I was accepted during the fall of my sophomore year). I'm not sure if this is enough for the clinical experience. Some people told me before that I should only pick one clinical volunteering position. Should I leave the hospital volunteering altogether and find a clinical job? Or should I continue hospital volunteering either at the current place or another?

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[LizzyM]

You have no obligation to list any activity on your application that you don't wish to list. There are worse things than doing nothing but studying during freshman year.

You don't need a letter of recommendation from a hospital volunteer coordinator. You will need a contact who can vouch for your participation in the experience.

The Patient Navigator position sounds great and it is too bad that it can't be more hours.
You will need more experience including shadowing and volunteering and/or employment. What you choose is up to you.

 

[Medigal]

Thank you for the advice! I forgot to mention that I am planning to shadow through a hospital program in another state so that will be a one time experience but I will try to find a physician who can let me shadow for the long-term. Regarding job, I am currently a TA for a bio lab so that takes up a bunch of my time in addition to the research position. Is it necessary to have a paid clinical experience or volunteering is fine? I have seen many people having a clinical job and I feel that I am not doing enough.

You have no obligation to list any activity on your application that you don't wish to list. There are worse things than doing nothing but studying during freshman year.

You don't need a letter of recommendation from a hospital volunteer coordinator. You will need a contact who can vouch for your participation in the experience.

The Patient Navigator position sounds great and it is too bad that it can't be more hours.
You will need more experience including shadowing and volunteering and/or employment. What you choose is up to you.

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[Cornfed101]

Is it necessary to have a paid clinical experience or volunteering is fine?

Paid clinical is not necessary. Volunteer clinical is fine.

 

[candbgirl]

Paid clinical is not necessary. Volunteer clinical is fine.

But OP needs way more than the projected 32 hours at application time. OP need at least 150 hours of clinical experience, 50 hours of shadowing and at least 150 hours of nonclinical volunteering to the unserved/underserved in his community.

 

[Cornfed101]

But OP needs way more than the projected 32 hours at application time. OP need at least 150 hours of clinical experience, 50 hours of shadowing and at least 150 hours of nonclinical volunteering to the unserved/underserved in his community.

OP, why don't you list someone else as the contact for the first volunteer position? I wouldn't even deal with the crappy new volunteer coordinator. I had activities that were old that I had no idea who they could contact so I listed someone I worked with (who doesn't even work there anymore) and the old phone number I had. You shouldn't sacrifice the hours that you actually volunteered to appease someone you will likely never see again. Just put the hours that you actually volunteered on your application and list someone else as the contact. It could even be someone else you volunteered with.

 

[Medigal]

Paid clinical is not necessary. Volunteer clinical is fine.

Thank you for the information!

 

[Medigal]

But OP needs way more than the projected 32 hours at application time. OP need at least 150 hours of clinical experience, 50 hours of shadowing and at least 150 hours of nonclinical volunteering to the unserved/underserved in his community.

If I decide to continue my hospital volunteering, I can get more than 150 hours from the hospital paired with 32 hours from the other clinical position. Would that be enough to qualify as clinical experience? That, of course, did not include the shadowing hours which I will have enough by the time of application.