Flipping out about EC's

[MacVA]

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Hello,

Frequent lurker/Infrequent poster here. Needless to say, I am flipping out about my EC's - I plan on applying in June 2011 and I almost no clinical experience thus far. Basically, between work and school I haven't found the time to fit them in.

I have about 80 hours with hospice volunteering. 15 hours of shadowing.
Can you give me any advice on how I can get some clinical experience quick?

I have really good EC's from my college days from 2003 - 2006.

BTW, sci gpa is 4.0 and cgpa 3.73. MCAT practice scores around a 29. Still have 3 months of studying left.

 

[EdLongshanks]

Hello,

Frequent lurker/Infrequent poster here. Needless to say, I am flipping out about my EC's - I plan on applying in June 2011 and I almost no clinical experience thus far. Basically, between work and school I haven't found the time to fit them in.

I have about 80 hours with hospice volunteering. 15 hours of shadowing.
Can you give me any advice on how I can get some clinical experience quick?

I have really good EC's from my college days from 2003 - 2006.

BTW, sci gpa is 4.0 and cgpa 3.73. MCAT practice scores around a 29. Still have 3 months of studying left.

Ahh, the Student Doctor's Neurotics pattern kicks in again.

 

[sgtbrushes]

EC's as a non-trad is the most frustrating part, in my opinion. No problem balancing work and school (back when I used to), but finding time outside of M-F 8 am - 8 pm to get clinical experience is difficult. For volunteering, do something completely unrelated to medicine. If you can't find volunteering opportunities, then you are failing - that's the easy part.

The majority of my "clinical experience" is shadowing. Since I go to a large university that has a med school, finding Docs who don't have a "saturated shadowing schedule" is difficult. I basically just googled Doctors whose practice was at least 30 minutes from the university, put on a suit, and drove around town dropping off letters by hand. Do a little research on vitals.com (some inaccurate information sometimes, so take it with a grain of salt), make the letter somewhat personal (family, brief hobbies, why MD, etc.). Eventually, one of the staff members will tell the Doc, "This kid was here in a suit wanting to shadow." I had to go to over a dozen primary care offices before I found a Doc willing to let me shadow at the times I was available.

If you do it this way, I think the Doctors can be more receptive to letting you shadow - let them know a brief history of yourself, and when they realize you know how to conduct yourself professionally, they are more willing to let you shadow, than say, a 20-year old LOLPREMED.

 

[MacVA]

EC's as a non-trad is the most frustrating part, in my opinion. No problem balancing work and school (back when I used to), but finding time outside of M-F 8 am - 8 pm to get clinical experience is difficult. For volunteering, do something completely unrelated to medicine. If you can't find volunteering opportunities, then you are failing - that's the easy part.

Thanks for the suggestions. I am really looking for some sort of suitable non clinical volunteer work that I could put in about 100 hours before next summer. Do you have a any ideas?

 

[PostHaste]

Two reeeeally easy ones to get started in:
- Animal shelter
- Food pantry

Your school likely has a volunteer services coordinator or office or something to that effect. Even my teeny tiny undergrad with no academic advisors had a volunteer coordinator.

You could try http://www.volunteermatch.org/.

Craigslist has postings for volunteer gigs. I got in touch with a great ESL tutoring program through CL.

Keep in mind, it's continuity and length of service they're looking for, not just # of hours.

 

[siliso]

I think you're good. You need to have enough to talk about at an interview and show some commitment, and you probably do, especially if you're still doing the hospice thing.

 

[Mr Hippopotamus]

Try to get your volunteering hours to 100+. Your GPA is solid. Between your hospice work and your ECs from undergrad, you should be alright if you demonstrate that you are continuing to be involved and interested. Schools understand that you have a life and responsibilities, so spending 3 months in Africa fighting Guinea worm is probably not practical. Personally I spent a lot of interview time talking about EC's I did way back in 2004. One of the advantages non-trad's have is a larger and longer range of experience.

 

[MacVA]

Try to get your volunteering hours to 100+. Your GPA is solid. Between your hospice work and your ECs from undergrad, you should be alright if you demonstrate that you are continuing to be involved and interested. Schools understand that you have a life and responsibilities, so spending 3 months in Africa fighting Guinea worm is probably not practical. Personally I spent a lot of interview time talking about EC's I did way back in 2004. One of the advantages non-trad's have is a larger and longer range of experience.

Mr. Hippo - Thanks for the reassurances.

Just wanted to follow up and say it looks like I can get my hospice volunteer hours to 150 by application season. I also have the opportunity to do some research so I am going to take that on as well. In addition, I can get about 50 hours of shadowing from a combination of a hospitalist and critical care doctor. Should I try and shadow other specialities?

Also, should I be doing anymore volunteer work that will make me stand out?

MacVa

 

[badb100d]

I think you'll be fine with 50 hours of shadowing and critical care is a great field to look into. Generally, I think adcoms are less impressed with tons of shadowing since it is a passive activity so I wouldn't knock myself out to rack up the hours there. Looks like you're getting all your typical EC's in order. I don't know what other EC's you have from undergrad, but the one thing I'd add to your full plate is some community-based volunteering (non-clinical) as that also seems to be highly valued.

 

[funklab]

Hello,

Frequent lurker/Infrequent poster here. Needless to say, I am flipping out about my EC's - I plan on applying in June 2011 and I almost no clinical experience thus far. Basically, between work and school I haven't found the time to fit them in.

I have about 80 hours with hospice volunteering. 15 hours of shadowing.
Can you give me any advice on how I can get some clinical experience quick?

I have really good EC's from my college days from 2003 - 2006.

BTW, sci gpa is 4.0 and cgpa 3.73. MCAT practice scores around a 29. Still have 3 months of studying left.

That's not a terribly low amount of clinical experience. I shadowed one doc for one week. Other than that the only thing I had that could be construed as "clinical" experience was volunteering at a hospital 3 hrs per week, which I wen't out of my way to say "mostly involved shuffling papers" in my description of it... got in to my top choice.

 

[briton]

I agree with what's been said. Try to get your clinical experience up to 50 hours maybe but don't worry about getting a ton. Shadowing a doc making rounds in a hospital is a good way to get this done outside of 8-5. Most doctors' offices have someone making hospital rounds after hours so just call around a few local offices, explain your situation and hopefully things will work out.

Remember, there is no magic formula for med school admission or getting in would be a lot easier. It seems as though you will have plenty to talk about at the interviews that your numbers will probably get you. Good luck with your application.

 

[MacVA]

Hi all,

Thought I would update this thread. So far I have the following:

100 hours of Hospice Volunteering.
25 Hours of Shadowing.

In college - i was a D-I tennis player for two years. Academic Tutor.
President and Vice President of Club for two years.
And a bunch of others.

3.9 Science GPA, 3.73 Overall (Still need to take Ochem 2 Lab).

I tried as hard as I could to get some non-clinical volunteering. No one will call me back. I do mean no one. I would like to get some more clinical volunteering but at this point I dont think it is going to happen.

Anything else I can do expect smoke the MCAT?

 

[OrangeRoost]

Hi all,

Thought I would update this thread. So far I have the following:

100 hours of Hospice Volunteering.
25 Hours of Shadowing.

In college - i was a D-I tennis player for two years. Academic Tutor.
President and Vice President of Club for two years.
And a bunch of others.

3.9 Science GPA, 3.73 Overall (Still need to take Ochem 2 Lab).

I tried as hard as I could to get some non-clinical volunteering. No one will call me back. I do mean no one. I would like to get some more clinical volunteering but at this point I dont think it is going to happen.

Anything else I can do expect smoke the MCAT?

For nonclinical experience, you could do Meals-On-Wheels or serve food at a homeless shelter. If you can't find time to volunteer in a hospital or shadow during regular hours, try late at night or early morning a couple times. The ER is super interesting at these times and it shows some serous dedication.

 

[startoverat40]

how do you document EC activities, volunteering, shadowing etc? Are you supposed to get a LOR from each of them? most schools will only take 3 or 4 letters, so you couldn't send too many. so do you just list them in the personal statement and they take your word for it that you did those things?

 

[DrMidlife]

how do you document EC activities, volunteering, shadowing etc? Are you supposed to get a LOR from each of them? most schools will only take 3 or 4 letters, so you couldn't send too many. so do you just list them in the personal statement and they take your word for it that you did those things?

With AMCAS you get 15 slots to divide up your ECs. What on earth do 21 year olds fill those up with. I put a 15 year career in which I had maybe 17 job titles, that spanned multiple companies, into one slot in order to free up space for ECs that are relevant to med school.

Each activity slot gets:
type (from a list)
name (you pick)
start date
end date
Avg hrs/wk
Org name
Contact name
Contact title
Location
Description (1325 characters)

Best of luck to you.