How many EC hours are considered ideal?

[Wendy926]

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I am assuming that EC is "emergency center". Right? 🙂 How many volunteer hours for this is considered good or ideal for the average medical school? Thanks!

 

[jot]

i think EC on this board usually means extra-curricular. i think the idea (for emergency room) would be long enough for you to get a good idea whats going on and appreciate it. i guess that varies though. i don't think anybody is looking for 100 vs 400 vs 5,000 hours persey. its like asking how long should this paper be, "its relative" (for those who hate that cliche), but quality matters.
-jot

 

[Papa Smurf]

512.5.

 

[SMW]

EC generally means extracurricular on this site. There is no ideal number of hours for an EC or volunteer/clinical experiences. Enough so you can write/talk intelligently enough about it on your application and during interviews to knock the socks of an adcom! :wink:

Then again, Papa Smurf is usually right! 😛

 

[Diogenes]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by Papa Smurf:
•512.5.•••••you're gonna get people in trouble with your sloppy estimations Papa. It's 512.53726 hours.

 

[jot]

oh no, there is a certain number we were supposed to do? i better get crackin. <img border="0" alt="[Pity]" title="" src="graemlins/pity.gif" />

-jot

:wink:

 

[Papa Smurf]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by Diogenes:
• •••quote:•••Originally posted by Papa Smurf:
•512.5.•••••you're gonna get people in trouble with your sloppy estimations Papa. It's 512.53726 hours.•••••Damn it! You're right bro! No wonder I'm only on waitlists. If only I had volunteered those extra .03726 hours! And they said this process was a crapshoot. Looks like we've figured it out! <img border="0" alt="[Laughy]" title="" src="graemlins/laughy.gif" />

 

[Wendy926]

Thanks guys! At the medical center where I am volunteering, the coordinator mentioned the EC as the "emergency center". Does it really matter where you volunteer or is the emergency room a great place to do clinicals?

 

[SMW]

It's a great place if you think it's a great place. Doing what you want to do is a better approach than doing what you think adcoms will like. I did my clinical in doctors' offices.

 

[Resident Alien]

its not a crapshoot if you have a minimum threshold of 66.786 hours, with an extra 2 papers published in Cell.

 

[Tweetie_bird]

most of the volunteers at my school in an Emergency Room get to transport urine, blood and charts. Sometimes, they get to transport live patients!! WoOHOOO!! (sarcasm)

I don't think you want to do this if the above is part of your job description. It really *isn't* clinical, although you are exposed to a lot by mere observation. The reason people want you to do clinicals is so that you learn patient interaction, you learn a bit about ethics of different case studies, so you can learn and grow to see what medicine is really like when you're encountered with a real acutal ILL person. Anyway, I'm blabbering. All I have to say is, if you work in an ER, make sure you get something out of your time there besides being a gopher (or is it gofer??). I would say a few (perhaps 4-6??) months (10 or so hours each week) of real, clinical stuff should be able to show AD COMS that you are actually interested in doing medicine. Ofcourse, 1-2 years they would be impressed by. 5 years, 🙂 they would love that!
Good luck and be well.
Tweetie

 

[Mystique]

It's not how many hours that matters but rather what you did/saw during those hours. You could spend 200hrs in a hospital/doctor's office doing "clerical" work, OR you could spend 50hrs w/ some trauma surgeon or whatever doc watching him/her do his magic. My examples suck, but the point I'm trying to make is it's quality that's most important...not necessarily quantity. 🙂

 

[Flack Pinku]

Hi there,

The hours don't matter. Spending 6 (or more) hours a week is probably good. 4 hours/week is probably average. Do it for a couple of months at least--and I think here is where your "expressiveness" comes in--if you volunteered like this for just 6 months, and were able to talk about it like a pro, you win!

It all comes down to showing the Interviewer that you know how it really is to be a Doctor. Of course, there is that question "Hours Per Week".

 

[KU Brendan]

To add to what Flack said, make sure that whatever you choose to do for volunteering, you can talk with great interest and even passion about. During one of my interviews, we spent the entire time talking about my volunteer work since it was something that they could tell I was excited about. It had nothing to do with medicine, nor did any of my volunteering. Like some of the other people posting have said, if you volunteer in an ER or at a hospital, you are often doing scut work like transporting specimens and such--not that this is something bad--but I wanted something unique where I was not just another number. So, if being in the ER, no matter what you're doing, excites you and you can talk passionately about it, go for it! If not, I always suggest to find something else and to never volunteer at something just because you think it will look good on your transcript--interviewers see right through that kind of thing.

As for the number of hours, that's something that typically doesn't even make it to your CV (r?sum?), so just make sure you have quality and not necessarily quantity.

Yes, I am procrastinating because I just don't feel like studying. Only two more delightful days left of third year.

--Brendan--
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