Enough Clinical Experience?

[dm24980]

I know that you can never have "enough" clinical experience and that more is better (assuming you are learning something), but do you think the amount of clinical experience I have will hurt my application?

My medically-related experienced include:

I've been working at a pharmacy since Nov. 2007 for 10-25 hrs a week.

In high school I volunteered at a local hospital for 175 hours. My responsibilities included escorting patients, delivering flowers, and helping out in the ambulatory surgery unit by doing paperwork, and assembling IV tubing and urine sample packets. When I stopped volunteering after my senior year in high school, I was not sure what I wanted to do. I started shadowing the summer after my sophomore year in college. I have not started volunteering at the hospital again because I think I can learn more from shadowing, which is why I'm still shadowing and will continue shadowing. I know that volunteering is important because we should all do things for other people even when we could be doing other things that may benefit us more. That's why I do PLENTY of volunteering; it's just not medically-related.

I've shadowed 3 doctors, a rheumatologist (32 hrs), a cardiologist (9hrs), and a family practice resident (18 hrs).

I have other volunteering and extracurricular activities, but these are my only medically-related experiences.

Do you guys think I need more medically-related experiences? I know that I want to be a doctor, and I'll continue shadowing doctors in different specialties so that I'll have experience in a lot of different specialties when I have to decide which specialty to pursue. But do you think only having this much clinical experience will hurt my chances of getting into medical school?

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[NickNaylor]

If you can speak meaningfully about your experiences and can point to why you know you want to go into medicine, then you have enough experience.

I will say, though, that your raw number of hours is less than what most people on here seem to have.

 

[dm24980]

Thanks again Cole!

How many hours of shadowing, volunteering, and medically-related work would you say most people on SDN have?

 

[NickNaylor]

Most people seem to have 80-120 hours of shadowing in several specialties. I'm not really sure about the other stuff to be honest.

 

[apumic]

It's a huge range...

typical numbers here would be:

Shadowing: 40-100

Clinical: 250-500+

Research: 6-12+ mos

Volunteering: 150-300+



My own (estimated) are:

Volunteering: 400 non-medical/130 medical

Clinical: 2000

Shadowing: 30

Research: 3 yrs


IMO, Clinical>>>>>>>>>shadowing; of course, by Clinical, I mean a real clinical job with ongoing interaction with the entire pt care team and responsibility for pt care (ED/Psych/Surg Tech, RN, CNA, etc.)

FYI, pre-college numbers simply don't count, so your volunteering in HS wouldn't count. I'd say overall you seem pretty skimpy on clinical experience. Shadowing is fine for a small portion of your clinical exposure but really doesn't show you much. You're too limited in what you can do (i.e., observe and that's typically about it).

 

[familyaerospace]

I don't apply until next year, but I have 120 shadowing hours with more on the way as I've already scheduled them. I will be doing another 30 next week and I have another doctor already scheduled. I think the amount I am going to apply with is certainly on the high side even by SDN standards.

I have about ~200 hours of hospital volunteering and I intend to continue that for the next year so I will probably apply to medical school with between 400 and 500 hours (seems to be around average on SDN). I will have a few thousand hours of non-medical volunteering.

You do have me and I think many people on SDN beat in paid medically related work since the closest I come to your part time job at a pharmacy is doing research on medical technologies. I think most people on SDN don't have paid medically related work at all. I know there are a few nurses and a few EMTs on SDN who are applying to medical school, but they do not appear to be in the majority from what I've seen.

 

[ohgodidonteven]

You mean clinical research right? I've done about 600 hours or so of bench research (Alzheimer/Pancreatic Cancer - related), but I have not had the opportunity to do clincal research. Could you tell me more about it?

 

[familyaerospace]

No, it wasn't clinical, but it was related. I worked as a tech transfer consultant for 1.5 years at 60-80+ hours a week (I only wish I were kidding as I did not love my job) analysing biomedical technologies to see if things were worth investing more money into. Two of the government groups I worked for included the NIH, where I was working with their SBIR program, and the CDC. I also did some work for medical schools as well.

My actual research hours, if you don't include the above job as research and just as paid employment, is over 6700 hours of research resulting in 6 presentations, 3 journal articles, 4 radio interviews, and a newspaper interview so far. Most of it was psychological and behavioural research.

ETA: Whoops, I didn't realise you were probably not actually talking to me and were more likely talking to the poster above me. Forgive me on that one.

 

[ohgodidonteven]

The number 6700 almost blew my mind, but then I realized you were about a decade older than me. As much as I love benchwork, I want to spend junior year doing something else :<

 

[apumic]

You mean clinical research right? I've done about 600 hours or so of bench research (Alzheimer/Pancreatic Cancer - related), but I have not had the opportunity to do clincal research. Could you tell me more about it?

Not sure to whom you were writing.

When I said clinical, I meant clinical experience (not necessarily clinical research although clinical research could fulfill this req't). It is separate from shadowing (as it involves actual pt interaction beyond simply observing someone else provide care). One school defines it as "a position requiring the candidate to take at least some level of responsibility for the outcome of a pt's care," while LizzyM is a bit more liberal w/ her definition of "if you can smell pts, it is clinical experience." Obviously, different schools have different expectations for clinical experience. Either way, you should be able to talk about it effectively in an interview.

When it comes to research, clinical or bench is fine. Clinical research can often "kill 2 birds w/ 1 stone."

 

[ohgodidonteven]

Oh, you mean like working/volunteering at a hospital. Much more sense now. I'm not exactly sure how many hospitals would let you 'take responsibility for a patient's outcome' though, although being an EMT might work.

 

[apumic]

Oh, you mean like working/volunteering at a hospital. Much more sense now. I'm not exactly sure how many hospitals would let you 'take responsibility for a patient's outcome' though, although being an EMT might work.

The school that gave that definition is a top-20 school that tends to favor non-trads and/or students who take a gap year. I believe something like 80% of their accepted applicants have their EMT-B or CNA license. Most schools probably sit somewhere between those two definitions of clinical experience.

 

[mvenus929]

Thanks again Cole!

How many hours of shadowing, volunteering, and medically-related work would you say most people on SDN have?

I have about 10 hours of shadowing, 150-200 hours of hospital volunteering (and don't recommend it), and about 3000 hours of clinical work.

Most people seem to have 100 or so hours of shadowing, 100 or so hours of clinical volunteering, and very little clinical work (there are those who get the EMTs and CNAs and whatnot, but they really don't seem to be the norm).

 

[familyaerospace]

The number 6700 almost blew my mind, but then I realized you were about a decade older than me. As much as I love benchwork, I want to spend junior year doing something else :<

Research was my life for a few years. Until I calculated it out today, I didn't honestly believe I was over 5000. I don't think I want to calculate how many other hours I've spent doing other things like teaching, leadership, etc.