Help: clinical experience vs. research!!?

[Mitochondr1a]

I am currently coming into my second year of pre-med at a top public university and have been working as a PCA (CNA) at a large level 1 trauma teaching hospital affiliated with the school for about 4 months now. I have currently discovered research in neurodegenerative disease and the effects of cocaine on the brain in affiliation with the neuroscience department of the hospital, directed by a research assistant professor with a PhD in neuroscience. PCA work requires me to put in a minimum of 36 hours per month throughout school, and this new research opportunity (If I move forward with it) would require 10+ hours a week, all on top of the upcoming pre-med course load. I would like advice to steer me in the right direction here on what next steps I should take and the significance of these for medical school. I currently have a 3.89 GPA and really want to keep it up. Thanks

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[chilly_md]

Thread moved to general Pre-Medical forums.

You will need clinical experience when applying to medical school. So far, it seems you've accumulated around 120 hours, give or take, over this past summer. You will need more than that by the time you apply, but have time to get it. If you do not have other time commitments outside of these 2 activities, this will be 20+ hours a week on top of school, so I would be mindful of protecting your grades. A large university with a teaching hospital should have many research opportunities if you can't get on to the same team a year from now.

Do not forget to get non-clinical volunteering with the less fortunate in your local community.

 

[LizzyM]

Concur with @chilly_md . Also, if you are taking o-chem this year, be prepared for a slight decline in your GPA but don't fret, this is very common and may result in a "Nike swoop" to your GPA year-over-year.

If you can keep up with the clinical job and do research (is it possible to do this for college credit at some point -- two birds and all that), that's great. As mentioned, you should also try to get at least some community service with the less fortunate, ideally face-to-face with people facing hardships. 8 hours per month for the next 2 years (one day or split to two hours/week) is sufficient, more would be better. Maybe in your desire to help people, you've already been doing that for years now?