Medical Do I have a chance this upcoming cycle or should I take a gap year?

[Goro]

I've been really confused digging through posts here and on reddit about experiences and such. I'm set to graduate in June from a mediocre state school. I wanted to take my MCAT end of June and apply July? Or is it still realistic to take the MCAT July and apply August? I'm thinking maybe I might take the MCAT in August, take a gap year to boost my volunteer hours and then apply in 2022. I plan on applying almost exclusively DO schools (about 25). One MD (OHSU) because it's in my state.

Current Stats
cGPA: 3.89
AMCAS sGPA: 3.91
AACOMAS sGPA: 3.94

Extra Curriculars (expected by June)
Non-Clinical Volunteering: ~200 hours

• Humane Society (most of the hours, from 4 month commitment by June)
• Hospice pen pal program (12.5 hours over summer in 2020)
• Several children's events through different organizations (scattered hours from 2019)

Clinical Volunteering: Hopefully 100 hours

• Just applied to be a volunteer with a hospice

Other:

• Work as a teaching assistant for organic chemistry students (~80 hours from school year length commitment)

Shadowing: ~100 hours

• Pulmonologist
• Cardiologist
• Gastroenterologist
• Endocrinologist
• Family Medicine/OMT

I've seen mixed feedback about shadowing counting as clinic experience and how the AACOMAS doesn't separate it out. Most of my shadow hours (~80) are with the OMT DO who specializes in only doing OMT/OMM treatment as his practice. He lets me hands on work with patients, palpating them and doing manipulations under his complete guidance and supervision at every session I attend, with patient permission. I was wondering if this would count as clinical experience since it was more than just sitting in the room like my other shadowing experiences? Having the opportunity to work with those patients personally and having positive feedback are what convinced me I want to go DO. Some have told me not to say I worked with the patients at all and it would reflect poorly on me for "treating" them without having the knowledge of medical school. Yet it's one of the big motivators for me to want to become a doctor? This "controversy" is why I'm posting in this forum.

I fear with the challenge of acquiring clinical volunteering time with patients during COVID and only recently applying to be a volunteer at the hospice that it may look terrible on my application if I tried to apply this year. I'm also worried about not having any long term volunteering commitments (that I tried to start last year only for COVID to shut those opportunities down). I want to know how an ADCOM would look at this if we assumed my MCAT score was around 510.

It's shadowing, not patient contact experience. Clinical experience is the latter three words of the last sentence.

Your ECs are rather cookie cutter; Can you get another 100+ hours of clinical experiences for a mid-late August app? You can get verified and start the process earlier with a throwaway school.

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[TheBoneDoctah]

I'm a little confused about how you said clinical experience is patient contact experience but that my shadowing was not that. I was asking about those ~80 hours of shadowing where I was always doing direct patient contact (talking and touching) during those experiences. So because it was under the title of "shadowing" it's still not considered patient contact?

Actually yes, I could realistically get another 100+ clinical hours from something else for a mid-late August app. Is that not considered too risky in terms of being "later" in the cycle?

How many clinical/non-clinical hours will you have by the time you SEND IN YOUR APP. For non-clinical, you need more hours helping people less fortunate than you as what you listed above, you have zero.

You need more clinical hours as well, however you have a stellar GPA. If you added some hours to your clinical and non-clinical and scored 505+ on MCAT you will likely get many interviews at DO schools.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

I have just applied with my local food bank and hospital as well. Among those I believe I'll be able to accumulate a solid chunk of hours by August. In your opinion, will applying in August still have a fair chance of landing interviews timeline wise?

Good and yes.

 

[Goro]

Shadowing is a passive experience designed to inform you as to what a doctor's day is like, and how different doctors approach the practice of medicine.
The clinical experience that I was referring to is patient contact experience. This is not shadowing. This is interacting with patients to let admissions committees know that you really want to be a doctor, and that you know what you're getting into for the next 30 to 40 years.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Food bank will be great non-clinical experiences. Regardless if you count those “shadowing” hours, you still will need more clinical hours. You can do this!