Dietary aide in nursing home during gap year?

[kinty]

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Hey all,

I'm currently moving back to my hometown and looking for a medically-related job. Since I'm still away, I'm scouring online for a job in the meantime. I came across a part-time job that would most likely fit into my schedule this Fall.

Looks like the main duties of a "dietary aide" are preparing and delivering food to residents with stocking/cleaning afterwards. It says I'll be "working with the ill, disabled, elderly emotionally upset, and at times hostile people." Does this count as a clinical experience? What do you think AdComs will think of this position when I attend interviews this Fall?

 

[Catalystik]

I'm currently moving back to my hometown and looking for a medically-related job. Since I'm still away, I'm scouring online for a job in the meantime. I came across a part-time job that would most likely fit into my schedule this Fall.

Looks like the main duties of a "dietary aide" are preparing and delivering food to residents with stocking/cleaning afterwards. It says I'll be "working with the ill, disabled, elderly emotionally upset, and at times hostile people." Does this count as a clinical experience? What do you think AdComs will think of this position when I attend interviews this Fall?

A dietary aide also often helps residents select foods that fit their dietary restrictions, and may assist with wheelchair transportation to a central dining area, besides scrubbing pots and pans. If this is a skilled-level nursing home, hospital, or inpatient Alzheimer's Unit, you'd have plenty of opportunities to engage current patients in a helpful way (even though that component may be only 50% of the job). If, OTOH, it's an independent or assisted living facility peopled by elderly residents, many adcomms won't judge it to be "clinical" in the way that you'd like it to be.

 

[LizzyM]

Are they patients or residents...? If they are not patients, it isn't a clinical experience in my book. That said, food service jobs where you deal with the public including the ill, disabled, elderly, emotionally upset and sometimes hostile people can be formative. You are as likely to meet these people as a waitress in a local diner as you are in an assisted living facility.

Do you need a medically-related job? If so, there are far better jobs in a hospital or other faciltiy where health care services are being delivered by licensed professionals. If you just want a job that will help prepare you for a job in a service profession that deals with people who are not at their best, then food service or retail of any kind might be an appropriate choice.

 

[Goro]

Hey all,

I'm currently moving back to my hometown and looking for a medically-related job. Since I'm still away, I'm scouring online for a job in the meantime. I came across a part-time job that would most likely fit into my schedule this Fall.

Looks like the main duties of a "dietary aide" are preparing and delivering food to residents with stocking/cleaning afterwards. It says I'll be "working with the ill, disabled, elderly emotionally upset, and at times hostile people." Does this count as a clinical experience? What do you think AdComs will think of this position when I attend interviews this Fall?

This is great. I have a high opinion of those will to work with the more fragile members of our society, and up front with reminders of our mortality.