I exaggerated my EC's on AMCAS and I got called on it.

[ortnakas]

One of the most endearing things any doctor ever did for me was bring me a drink of water at 5 a.m. in the delivery room when the nurse was busy with my baby and there was no one else around to help. If you are too good to be concerned for a patient's comfort, then you don't deserve a seat in medical school no matter how good your grades and scores are.

Agreed.

I volunteered a bit as a pre-med, and mostly just stocked shelves and whatnot, but I did go in the patients' rooms and asked if they needed anything. One patient had recently been let off being NPO and desperately wanted a Snickers bar, so I checked with his nurses to get the okay, and then bought him one. It took me five minutes and eighty-five cents, but he told me it was the best thing that happened to him all week.

Someday, hopefully all of us will be providing patient care as capable physicians; for now, as a pre-med, you can provide care for patients by helping them be a little less thirsty, hungry, bored, or lonely. I truly hope that I'm never "too good" to be concerned about that.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[jl lin]

Instead of trying to check the boxes and play a game, you could actually try being someone interesting, doing worthwhile things that take effort and selflessness, and getting actual experience with the profession you want to dedicate your life to.

Jesus. Some people seem to feel that med school is their right for being so darn smart and they resent having to pretend like a good person who knows what they're getting into.

Very well said.

 

[NeuResurgens]

Man, I never cease to be amazed at some of the anecdotes here. Holy crap.

 

[jl lin]

It wasn't a joke. They tell me every day.
Every single day. And I don't do anything about it, other than say you can get some juice later.
I'd like to help them, but I really can't.

In case the ^ above is not understood, ID is anesthesia, and that is significant. Just in case someone is totally aware, pre-op and direct post-op (or certain pre-procedure/post-procedure) patients usually don't get food and drink--OK, maybe some ice chips or so after anesthesia gives the OK post-op. Peri-surgical areas are not pit-stop areas for food and drink, and the way the schedule moves and the patients move, there is usually no time for this--unless the patient is getting her/his direct post-op recovery in a surgical ICU or some kind of ICU--but often then a patient is not getting anything by mouth either--at least not for a while.

As far as giving someone something, well, you have to know if it is medically OK to give someone something p.o. A nurse or doc may end up getting pretty pissed if you give someone something they cannot have for any variety of medical or surgical reasons.

Acts of kindness can be given with the best intentions, but someone else is taking responsibility for that patient in one way or another--and for what goes in and comes out of them, one way or the other.

First thing volunteers should know is they need to ask the patient's nurse or doc what the pt can have or do (get out of bed, whatever) before they attempt to be "nice" to the patient. That niceness may jump up to bite everyone on the butt--primarily the patient. And patients are not always aware (for one reason or another) or compliant. Hell, I am an RN, and I know enough to check with the patient's nurse, at the very least, if I am not that particular patient's nurse, if they request or want something--or their family asks or wants something for the patient. You can always, at the very least, be kind with whatever the prudent response is.

 

[wasteofspace323]

Man, I never cease to be amazed at some of the anecdotes here. Holy crap.

I agree completely. "I bought some woman a snicker's bar while volunteering." and "I told the janitor my MCAT score" were real hard hitters. Brought tears to me eye. I'm seriously having trouble coping with this empathy overload. I hope that one day I, too, can learn my janitor's name and tell them how I did on my MCAT. No, I'll go one step further and tell them my LizzyM.

 

[jl lin]

Not everyone has the same interests. If you can enjoy doing something as demeaning as bringing people water to drink, then feel free to be 'active' in your hospital volunteering. I for one couldn't stand it and for obvious reasons. My passions aren't in bringing people water, it's in treating people. I do not want to help you quench your thirst, like a servant, so you can smile. I want to be the guy in the white coat treating you for what you came for. It is for this reason that I always loved shadowing physicians and absolutely hated the hospital volunteering. Clinical volunteering was much better. Much more hands on and much more meaningful.

I don't judge any premeds doing it just for hours. It's not an assessment of someone's interests in medicine. It's an assessment of your willingness to be a patients dog. I'd like to see physicians rushing to get their patients water. They won't and that's because it's not their job or passion to so why should admissions expect that from me.

One of the best things anyone can get out of volunteering, and there are tons of things if one is truly a person that cares, is to get a better sense of empathy. To you, that sip of water may not seem like much; b/c you aren't dried out from any number/kind of medications, certain pathologies, or sometimes a ridiculously hot room--climate control in a hospital isn't as straightforward as it should seem. To the patient that can have that drink of water, it's an important need that has to be met. If you were in his/her shoes or bed, as it were, you might understand that. Looking at people and assessing their needs, and having a sense of care and respect for their needs is quintessential in medicine and healthcare. I haven't the time or patience for people that don't want to get a clue about empathy. It's not the only thing, and in emergencies, it may not even be a main thing--least not until later, but it is a very important thing. Sadly there is a number of people in healthcare in general, who are there primarily for the salary--I am talking techs, nurses, docs, med techs, whatever. I don't care if you give out water and talk with some patients in a hospital--so long as you aren't stupid about it--or if you get educated/trained and serve on a suicide hotline. Whether or not one has some genuine humanity is and should continue to be an important component in becoming a physician. People that really don't give a crap about people's needs don't belong in healthcare--at least not on the delivery of care end of things.

 

[NeuResurgens]

I agree completely. "I bought some woman a snicker's bar while volunteering." and "I told the janitor my MCAT score" were real hard hitters. Brought tears to me eye. I'm seriously having trouble coping with this empathy overload. I hope that one day I, too, can learn my janitor's name and tell them how I did on my MCAT. No, I'll go one step further and tell them my LizzyM.

I was referring more to the OP, but you know.

 

[jl lin]

How has this thread reached 10 pages?

Boredom.

 

[jl lin]

@Mad Jack

Um, I think that Corgi is doing CPR backwards.

 

[Mad Jack]

@Mad Jack

Um, I think that Corgi is doing CPR backwards.

It's clearly doing HVLA

 

[Spector1]

How has this thread reached 10 pages?

probably the premed sense of self righteousness

 

[Lost in Translation]

I don't understand Planes2Doc's posts.

 

[Gandyy]

Not replying to disagree with you, just to point out that boring and menial don't mean unimportant or unnecessary.

A good chunk of my volunteering hours involved taking medical supplies out of large boxes and apportioning them into smaller bags to be distributed to people in need of sterile injection supplies. It doesn't get much more boring/menial. But I turned up week after week to do it because they truly needed volunteer help (no budget for paid staff). And because there was (is) a blood borne pathogen epidemic raging, and every person who could avoid exposure was one less person to help the disease spread even further.

I wasn't even pre-med then. I was volunteering because I wanted to be doing something to give back to my community. It might be nice to WANT to be the guy in the white coat treating the patients once they were infected with the incurable, fatal illnesses, but at that point in my life, I wasn't qualified to do anything more important than grunt-work in the name of prevention. Certainly the menial and boring work I did could have been performed by a trained monkey... but if we were waiting around for trained monkeys or dollars from heaven to pay minimum wage employees to do it, then it wouldn't have gotten done. And a few more injection drug users would have used dirty needles and become infected with HIV or Hep C.

(Before anyone spouts off that they brought it on themselves, I remind you that infectious disease doesn't check your karma before it sets up shop. A person who gets infected through poor decision making can then go on to infect others who didn't do anything "wrong." Even if you want to write off a segment of the population as not worth helping, when it comes to public health and infectious disease - we are all in the same boat. You can't let just half of it sink.)

Yea, there are always instances of where it can help. Which in your case it did help.

There are many other tasks that you dont sign up for that dont even have a significant indirect effect on anyone's health.

 

[mehc012]

Also documenting by exception if you did not actually examine the part in question is lying. If you're doing an ankle sprain and you say no respiratory distress, TM's normal, oropharynx clear, no wheezes/rales/ronchi, no skin rash, mood and affect normal, PERLLA, EOMI (though this is not as bad because it's obvious to tell from talking). Now how many doctors will check TM's, oropharynx, the skin, lungs, heart, eyes on a simple ankle sprain? Almost NONE because it is a waste of time, yet they will overdocument and overbill.

It's pretty damn easy to document enough systems for the proper billing level without lying. Yes, as a scribe there were a few docs who would write up a 'normals' set for me to follow and didn't actually go through all of those, but even then, you only have to do that for a Level 5 chart...Level 4 requires so few systems that you can just put in whatever focused exam they did...and almost every doc I worked with, if what appeared as a 'simple' case ended up requiring Level 5, would duck back into the room and do an actual heart/lung/HEENT exam.

 

[mehc012]

My system has a little "normal" button which checks off the entire PE section and even the entire ROS. Most of the physicians just click what they found in the ROS and then use the normal button to respond negatively to every other possible option.

We were specifically disallowed from using this button to ensure that we made accurate charts.

 

[ortnakas]

I agree completely. "I bought some woman a snicker's bar while volunteering." and "I told the janitor my MCAT score" were real hard hitters. Brought tears to me eye. I'm seriously having trouble coping with this empathy overload. I hope that one day I, too, can learn my janitor's name and tell them how I did on my MCAT. No, I'll go one step further and tell them my LizzyM.

I don't think anyone is claiming that these acts of empathy are Nobel Peace Prize worthy, or even worth mentioning at an interview. They're just anecdotes showing that 1) volunteering isn't a total waste of time and 2) nobody's too good to be nice.

 

[wasteofspace323]

requiring Level 5

What the? Where did you work? We have a QAP reviewer and if you get put up for "performance review" if even one of your charts they randomly review isn't level 5. I've only done one sub level 5 chart and thats because the doc told me to do a level 1 one. This was because the patient came in, told him "I had to take off work to pick up my kid, can you just say I have a cough and give me an excuse". She was documented as having a cough.

Also I spent 1.5 hours last night at work listening to music because my favorite doctor cleared out the ED in half an hour flat. Maximum of 30 seconds with any given patient, even the one that started crying as he walked out.

 

[mehc012]

What the? Where did you work? We have a QAP reviewer and if you get put up for "performance review" if even one of your charts they randomly review isn't level 5. I've only done one sub level 5 chart and thats because the doc told me to do a level 1 one. This was because the patient came in, told him "I had to take off work to pick up my kid, can you just say I have a cough and give me an excuse". She was documented as having a cough.

Also I spent 1.5 hours last night at work listening to music because my favorite doctor cleared out the ED in half an hour flat. Maximum of 30 seconds with any given patient, even the one that started crying as he walked out.

Apparently somewhere that pays attention to the standards?
Our rule of thumb was focused exam + 1 in-house intervention/test = Level 4, full exam + 2 interventions/tests = Level 5, suture removal = Level 3.
So if they came in, we took a history, sent them home with a few scripts, that's a 4.
If they come in, get an XR, leave with ibu and crutches, that's a 4 (1 test) and they only need to do an ankle exam, for example. Actually, for isolated ortho issues they usually did a 4 even if they did XR + splinting, because they billed for the procedure itself, so no need to do a Lvl 5 exam for an ankle break.
Come in, history and basic blood work only → 4
Blood work and US/XR/CT → 5

 

[wasteofspace323]

Apparently somewhere that pays attention to the standards?
Our rule of thumb was focused exam + 1 in-house intervention/test = Level 4, full exam + 2 interventions/tests = Level 5, suture removal = Level 3.
So if they came in, we took a history, sent them home with a few scripts, that's a 4.
If they come in, get an XR, leave with ibu and crutches, that's a 4 (1 test) and they only need to do an ankle exam, for example. Actually, for isolated ortho issues they usually did a 4 even if they did XR + splinting, because they billed for the procedure itself, so no need to do a Lvl 5 exam for an ankle break.
Come in, history and basic blood work only → 4
Blood work and US/XR/CT → 5

I mean, did you work for a larger company or was it some smaller in-house or volunteer thing? I know its company policy that everything we do has to be level 5, it was on the standardized training to make everything level 5. Given that I worked for one of the larger companies, I would imagine that something like 50%+ of scribes out there are operating around "level 5 or bust".

 

[mehc012]

I mean, did you work for a larger company or was it some smaller in-house or volunteer thing? I know its company policy that everything we do has to be level 5, it was on the standardized training to make everything level 5. Given that I worked for one of the larger companies, I would imagine that something like 50% of scribes out there are operating around "level 5 or bust".

I worked for a giant company, the kind that violates labor laws and generally sucks.
Yes, in their training they said to do every chart to a level 5 standard.
Initially, the docs did their own Level assignations, so we just did everything to a 5's standards and didn't think about it. Then, some docs started busting us for 'overcharting' the level 4s. Some could be brutal if you checked boxes we didn't cover (on exam or history).
Finally, the billing assignments became a part of the chart and we were responsible for them. Then we had to make the call about what level to call it, and if we did it wrong the docs would discuss with us how to do it right because there was a huge incentive for them to do so.

Basically, we were hired by BigBadCompany, but we worked with the docs, did what they said to do, and mutually told BBC to bugger off on pretty much all fronts. I even stopped going to the mandatory meetings because they weren't paying us for them properly, so I really only interacted with the docs.

 

[ImmunoLove]

I agree completely. "I bought some woman a snicker's bar while volunteering." and "I told the janitor my MCAT score" were real hard hitters. Brought tears to me eye. I'm seriously having trouble coping with this empathy overload. I hope that one day I, too, can learn my janitor's name and tell them how I did on my MCAT. No, I'll go one step further and tell them my LizzyM.

In hindsight my story is silly...Just remembered it and typed and posted without thinking how it would be received (the other post just reminded me of her and I forgot myself and waxed poetic). I've had an unusual life and I've made friends were I can, and the cleaning lady was someone with whom I bonded, and so we shared our success and failures. I really appreciated her kindness toward me. Sorry, didn't mean to sound preachy about it, and it's not like I did her a service (it was truly the other way around). Didn't mean to make it more than it was. My apologies.

 

[Planes2Doc]

I don't understand Planes2Doc's posts.

What do you not understand?

In a nutshell... I'm just saying that the meaning of volunteering has been destroyed a long time ago by pre-meds. It's done as an activity to pad the application. Often times pre-meds are forced to do bitch work. This sort of volunteering doesn't show whether a pre-med will become a good physician or not. The end.

 

[Lost in Translation]

What do you not understand?

In a nutshell... I'm just saying that the meaning of volunteering has been destroyed a long time ago by pre-meds. It's done as an activity to pad the application. Often times pre-meds are forced to do bitch work. This sort of volunteering doesn't show whether a pre-med will become a good physician or not. The end.

This feels like a blanket statement that isn't necessary true of all hospital volunteer opportunities, however. And at the end of the day, what you get out of a volunteer opportunity strongly depends on how much effort and dedication you put into the position.

For example, I've been volunteering at the ED for almost 3 years, and in that time I've done the "small stuff": get water, make beds, move admitted patients to the inpatient floors, run labs to central/chemistry/micro. And while that's really all the program's description says you can be expected to do, I've also been able to shadow residents, help with LPs and routine suturing (I even helped an ortho resident stop a forearm venous bleed by holding pressure for like 20 minutes while he closed the wound, and that's not even the coolest thing I've participated in), fetched blood from the blood bank, and chatted with patients, among many, many other things that weren't in the "job description." However, none of these things would have been done had I not been proactive in approaching residents and attendings asking for such opportunities. It's possible that at my hospital the staff is more lenient about letting volunteers get up close and personal with patients and doctors/nurses alike, but I find it hard to believe that a doctor would say no to any volunteer who asked to shadow or do more hands-on stuff even if their main purpose for being there was to do the "bitch work."

 

[Psai]

Agreed.

I volunteered a bit as a pre-med, and mostly just stocked shelves and whatnot, but I did go in the patients' rooms and asked if they needed anything. One patient had recently been let off being NPO and desperately wanted a Snickers bar, so I checked with his nurses to get the okay, and then bought him one. It took me five minutes and eighty-five cents, but he told me it was the best thing that happened to him all week.

Someday, hopefully all of us will be providing patient care as capable physicians; for now, as a pre-med, you can provide care for patients by helping them be a little less thirsty, hungry, bored, or lonely. I truly hope that I'm never "too good" to be concerned about that.

And he was a type 2 diabetic, poorly controlled due to medication noncompliance and his inability to stop scarfing down sweets is evident in his hga1c of 15. That snickers along with the fruit drinks he had pushed his blood sugar to 300 which showed up on the EMR. His doctors saw it the next day and wondered why his glucose control was so difficult as they received a snarky email from a medicare lackey asking why that doctor had such trouble taking good care of his patients. A percentage of the payment was deducted from the reimbursement to punish their poor patient management

 

[jl lin]

What the? Where did you work? We have a QAP reviewer and if you get put up for "performance review" if even one of your charts they randomly review isn't level 5. I've only done one sub level 5 chart and thats because the doc told me to do a level 1 one. This was because the patient came in, told him "I had to take off work to pick up my kid, can you just say I have a cough and give me an excuse". She was documented as having a cough.

Also I spent 1.5 hours last night at work listening to music because my favorite doctor cleared out the ED in half an hour flat. Maximum of 30 seconds with any given patient, even the one that started crying as he walked out.

Ummm, I suppose one would have had to have seen, first hand, what this was all about. A lot of BS can come into the ED, and the docs needs to be able to clear it out, b/c one never knows when the crap will hit the fan--in spades! But I find that which I put in bold on the dubious side of things. Of course, again, I emphasize that I wasn't there to know what the list of patients and their issues were.

 

[jl lin]

This feels like a blanket statement that isn't necessary true of all hospital volunteer opportunities, however. And at the end of the day, what you get out of a volunteer opportunity strongly depends on how much effort and dedication you put into the position.

For example, I've been volunteering at the ED for almost 3 years, and in that time I've done the "small stuff": get water, make beds, move admitted patients to the inpatient floors, run labs to central/chemistry/micro. And while that's really all the program's description says you can be expected to do, I've also been able to shadow residents, help with LPs and routine suturing (I even helped an ortho resident stop a forearm venous bleed by holding pressure for like 20 minutes while he closed the wound, and that's not even the coolest thing I've participated in), fetched blood from the blood bank, and chatted with patients, among many, many other things that weren't in the "job description." However, none of these things would have been done had I not been proactive in approaching residents and attendings asking for such opportunities. It's possible that at my hospital the staff is more lenient about letting volunteers get up close and personal with patients and doctors/nurses alike, but I find it hard to believe that a doctor would say no to any volunteer who asked to shadow or do more hands-on stuff even if their main purpose for being there was to do the "bitch work."

^Absolutely.

Also,, you have to be willing to be low-man on totem pole and humbly do various volunteer acts, with a genuinely positive attitude, in order for people to get to know you and assess if you are there to really help and even learn. Physicians and nurses aren't going to spend time on people that they figure are just there to take up space and get a check-off on volunteering, and who are not willing to hunker down and be part of a genuine team. If you are genuine and serious, you won't think running errands or the like is beneath you or a waste of time.

 

[jl lin]

What do you not understand?

In a nutshell... I'm just saying that the meaning of volunteering has been destroyed a long time ago by pre-meds. It's done as an activity to pad the application. Often times pre-meds are forced to do bitch work. This sort of volunteering doesn't show whether a pre-med will become a good physician or not. The end.

Volunteering can be a vital means by which someone's motivation and character can be assessed. It's not perfect. Nothing is.

 

[jl lin]

It's clearly doing HVLA

I know nothing about HVLA, accept, honestly, at times it scares me, and I have only known one DO that was truly careful and excelled in it. (But the areas I have worked require attention to so many other things, one could hardly expect one of these surgeons, anesthesiologists, etc, to have had time to excel in practice of OMT.) The DO to which I refer was one in practice like 20 years ago or so. He was the only one I really trusted with manipulation. I was sad and pissed when he died relatively young from a stupid accident. No one else could straighten out like he could. I surmised that some may just be inherently better at it than others. It also may be that there is so much to just learning medicine, period, people are overwhelmed with this other aspect of osteopathic medicine.

Personally I wonder if in practice it has fallen out of favor or inclusion with many osteopaths. (Sorry to go so OT. I wish there were more docs like the one I spoke of that prematurely died. Then there are people w/ facet-joint disease and the like that should not be manipulated of course. So there is this whole aspect that kind of scares me, and I wonder if this might be an issue if accepted into a DO program.
"Primum non nocere" and all of that.)

At any, your little friend seems to be taking a very hyper approach--he's quite enthusiastic.

 

[Mad Jack]

I know nothing about HVLA, accept, honestly, at times it scares me, and I have only known one DO that was truly careful and excelled in it. (But the areas I have worked require attention to so many other things, one could hardly expect one of these surgeons, anesthesiologists, etc, to have had time to excel in practice of OMT.) The DO to which I refer was one in practice like 20 years ago or so. He was the only one I really trusted with manipulation. I was sad and pissed when he died relatively young from a stupid accident. No one else could straighten out like he could. I surmised that some may just be inherently better at it than others. It also may be that there is so much to just learning medicine, period, people are overwhelmed with this other aspect of osteopathic medicine.

Personally I wonder if in practice it has fallen out of favor or inclusion with many osteopaths. (Sorry to go so OT. I wish there were more docs like the one I spoke of that prematurely died. Then there are people w/ facet-joint disease and the like that should not be manipulated of course. So there is this whole aspect that kind of scares me, and I wonder if this might be an issue if accepted into a DO program.
"Primum non nocere" and all of that.)

At any, your little friend seems to be taking a very hyper approach--he's quite enthusiastic.

I'd PM you to send you a response, but your profile is set to limited so I'm not allowed. 98% of DOs don't use OMM at all, and you don't use OMM on patients with disease that contraindicates it. I doubt I'll use it on anyone but friends and family, personally, and I'll never do cervical stuff because I'm not comfortable with it. Anyway, back on topic

 

[familyaerospace]

welp, I've not lied on any part of my application, but being an older non-trad, I have many, many hours listed under research and volunteering, and I am now a little paranoid I'll be reported. The good news is that it's all verifiable. I guess I'd be peeved if I was reported without first having had the opportunity to provide documentation. That, and I under-estimated my hours, but I have been engaged in clinical work for 8 years now, so even rounding down by 1000s still leaves large numbers which feel inflated (until you look at the years and realize it makes sense...hopefully). Ugh. Definitely time to contact all the refs and confirm hours to make sure we are on the same page. SDN, always good for a little dose of anxiety. At least the remedy suffices...

You will be fine. I had a few items that were in the thousands of hours. I think if it makes sense or is reasonable, you will be ok.

 

[ortnakas]

And he was a type 2 diabetic, poorly controlled due to medication noncompliance and his inability to stop scarfing down sweets is evident in his hga1c of 15. That snickers along with the fruit drinks he had pushed his blood sugar to 300 which showed up on the EMR. His doctors saw it the next day and wondered why his glucose control was so difficult as they received a snarky email from a medicare lackey asking why that doctor had such trouble taking good care of his patients. A percentage of the payment was deducted from the reimbursement to punish their poor patient management

Ha- I made sure he was allowed to have it before I got it for him to avoid this story, don't worry. (Coincidentally, in my months of volunteering there he was the one and only patient who was actually allowed to have what he asked me for).

 

[Promethean]

But we should also understand that there are certain things that people will and will not do. Many doctors didn't start working as janitors, techs, or other positions, and that's okay. I don't see doctors polishing the floors. I also don't see doctors cleaning the rooms or cleaning off a patient's poop. And you know what, that's okay too.

I have seen doctors cleaning rooms and wiping up poop. I've seen doctors help people on and off bedpans, because they were there and the urgency was great. I've seen attending surgeons pushing mops and pulling garbage in the OR because we were getting slammed and needed all the help we could get to turn over the room for the next case.

Usually, there are other hands to do that kind of labor, and it makes sense to delegate so that the team can be most efficient. But if those hands aren't available, the doctor can choose to be too good to demean themselves and let the patient suffer until someone else can take care of it, or they can do what is best for the patient, even if it is "below their paygrade."

I don't think that anyone is arguing that we should replace janitors and patient care techs with physicians. Obviously, efficiency requires that tasks are apportioned according to capacity to perform them, and someone with specialized knowledge and skills shouldn't waste time on an activity that could be done by many others. But I don't think anyone should be working in healthcare who believes that they are too important to lower themselves to do certain tasks, if the necessity arises.

 

[Planes2Doc]

This feels like a blanket statement that isn't necessary true of all hospital volunteer opportunities, however. And at the end of the day, what you get out of a volunteer opportunity strongly depends on how much effort and dedication you put into the position.

For example, I've been volunteering at the ED for almost 3 years, and in that time I've done the "small stuff": get water, make beds, move admitted patients to the inpatient floors, run labs to central/chemistry/micro. And while that's really all the program's description says you can be expected to do, I've also been able to shadow residents, help with LPs and routine suturing (I even helped an ortho resident stop a forearm venous bleed by holding pressure for like 20 minutes while he closed the wound, and that's not even the coolest thing I've participated in), fetched blood from the blood bank, and chatted with patients, among many, many other things that weren't in the "job description." However, none of these things would have been done had I not been proactive in approaching residents and attendings asking for such opportunities. It's possible that at my hospital the staff is more lenient about letting volunteers get up close and personal with patients and doctors/nurses alike, but I find it hard to believe that a doctor would say no to any volunteer who asked to shadow or do more hands-on stuff even if their main purpose for being there was to do the "bitch work."

That's pretty awesome that you got to do those things! Personally, I have met a couple of people who have had these kinds of experiences. In fact, I have a friend from Texas who actually enjoyed his hospital ED volunteering so much as a pre-med, that he continued to do it even after he dropped pre-med! So yeah, I am guilty of making a guilty statement. But based on the majority of actual fellow classmates I have talked to from my school and what I have heard from the vocal minority on SDN, it appears that your experience is less common. A lot of pre-meds would kill to have an opportunity like yours, and I would have too! One time I was pulled in by an emergency medicine physician to witness a procedure, but usually they ignored me or were just downright rude. Now I'll admit I wasn't the happiest volunteer out there, but I ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS did what I was asked, and always with a smile on my face. There was no reason to be treated poorly. Maybe I should have been more proactive asking doctors to view procedures or help them (there were no residents, it was not a teaching hospital), but the cold shoulder they gave me turned me off from ever doing so. I think that if more pre-meds had experiences like yours, they would enjoy volunteering. And yes, we hear about quite a few of those experiences...

But the important thing we forget about SDN is that it's a community of very passionate pre-meds that go above and beyond what typical pre-meds will do. That's why the people in this community made old MCAT scores of 36 sound easy, thousands of hours over multiple activities sound easy, and also they often have the coolest sounding volunteer experiences. But, this isn't all too reflective of the general pre-med population that isn't on SDN. Therefore, while your experience does indeed sound amazing and I'm envious of it, very few actual pre-meds will actually experience it. It sounds like the more common theme, especially which fellow classmates (none have ever been members on SDN) experienced, is having to do mostly housekeeping and being shunned in the corner.

 

[jl lin]

I'd PM you to send you a response, but your profile is set to limited so I'm not allowed. 98% of DOs don't use OMM at all, and you don't use OMM on patients with disease that contraindicates it. I doubt I'll use it on anyone but friends and family, personally, and I'll never do cervical stuff because I'm not comfortable with it. Anyway, back on topic

So sorry Mad. I didn't realize that feature was still off. Thanks for your reply. ITA about cervical stuff. I will change my settings, b/c I really do have a number of questions about DO programs.

Sorry again for going OT.

 

[Planes2Doc]

I have seen doctors cleaning rooms and wiping up poop. I've seen doctors help people on and off bedpans, because they were there and the urgency was great. I've seen attending surgeons pushing mops and pulling garbage in the OR because we were getting slammed and needed all the help we could get to turn over the room for the next case.

Usually, there are other hands to do that kind of labor, and it makes sense to delegate so that the team can be most efficient. But if those hands aren't available, the doctor can choose to be too good to demean themselves and let the patient suffer until someone else can take care of it, or they can do what is best for the patient, even if it is "below their paygrade."

I don't think that anyone is arguing that we should replace janitors and patient care techs with physicians. Obviously, efficiency requires that tasks are apportioned according to capacity to perform them, and someone with specialized knowledge and skills shouldn't waste time on an activity that could be done by many others. But I don't think anyone should be working in healthcare who believes that they are too important to lower themselves to do certain tasks, if the necessity arises.

Hey I totally agree with you. I don't think that anyone should feel that they are too good to help with anything. I'm willing to help with anything if anyone needs it. But in a well-oiled machine of a hospital with no shortage of staff, this need doesn't arise. At this point, I'm only on my second hospital of rotations, and both were appropriately staffed. At some point I'll see exactly what you're talking about.

 

[jl lin]

I have seen doctors cleaning rooms and wiping up poop. I've seen doctors help people on and off bedpans, because they were there and the urgency was great. I've seen attending surgeons pushing mops and pulling garbage in the OR because we were getting slammed and needed all the help we could get to turn over the room for the next case.

Usually, there are other hands to do that kind of labor, and it makes sense to delegate so that the team can be most efficient. But if those hands aren't available, the doctor can choose to be too good to demean themselves and let the patient suffer until someone else can take care of it, or they can do what is best for the patient, even if it is "below their paygrade."

I don't think that anyone is arguing that we should replace janitors and patient care techs with physicians. Obviously, efficiency requires that tasks are apportioned according to capacity to perform them, and someone with specialized knowledge and skills shouldn't waste time on an activity that could be done by many others. But I don't think anyone should be working in healthcare who believes that they are too important to lower themselves to do certain tasks, if the necessity arises.

Sorry @Promethean . Fixed that w/ bold font.

I basically agree with your philosophy Promethean, but in all honesty, in 20 years as a critical care RN, I have never, ever, once seen what I have made bold. I am not speaking pro or con, although, it is clear that when you have a zillion pts over which to be responsible, or even a handful that are in the units circling the bowl, the last thing you have time to do are those thing you have mentioned. Never seen it. I would certainly be in awe of the doc's compassion, meek spirit, and time management skills. 99.9999999999999999% of the time, I'd say that it's NEVER done. In fact, it is so utterly rare, it would be a complete anomaly altogether.

 

[Mad Jack]

Hey I totally agree with you. I don't think that anyone should feel that they are too good to help with anything. I'm willing to help with anything if anyone needs it. But in a well-oiled machine of a hospital with no shortage of staff, this need doesn't arise. At this point, I'm only on my second hospital of rotations, and both were appropriately staffed. At some point I'll see exactly what you're talking about.

I was in a well-staffed hospital, but every now and again the nurses would be helping a patient and you'd be in the room anyway, and even though it wasn't your job, they might ask you for a boost, or to help turn a patient, or whatever, because if you help them you can ease that patient's discomfort in about ten seconds, whereas if they have to wait, it might take another fifteen or thirty minutes before another nurse or a CNA is available. I did a lot of things that weren't my job as an RT because they just made sense to help the patient and weren't that much of a bother, and I'm sure I'll end up doing a lot of those little tasks as a medical student and physician as well.

 

[Promethean]

Hey I totally agree with you. I don't think that anyone should feel that they are too good to help with anything. I'm willing to help with anything if anyone needs it. But in a well-oiled machine of a hospital with no shortage of staff, this need doesn't arise. At this point, I'm only on my second hospital of rotations, and both were appropriately staffed. At some point I'll see exactly what you're talking about.

Yeah, we aren't arguing. Just... "well-oiled machine of a hospital with no shortage of staff..." I have never, ever, seen that freaking unicorn. Please, tell me where it is. I desperately want to witness it, just once. I've never worked on a unit that wasn't always on the verge of catastrophe due to short staffing.

Meanwhile, administration was fudging OR availability for Level 1 Trauma readiness, having our in house OR nurse/scrub team working through the night to do elective / non-urgent bs so that they weren't paying anyone for downtime. Then when the poo hit the fan, we were scrambling to bring in teams from home for real emergencies. Admin was presented with evidence of this time and again, and repeated each time that they didn't see the problem. (Because no one had *yet* died due to lack of an available OR, and the close calls haven't *yet* resulted in lawsuits.)

If they weren't willing to pay for critical staff to be on hand, you'd better believe they didn't have enough housekeepers either. If we needed to reuse a particular OR, whoever wasn't doing something else was cleaning. (EDIT: I'm not saying that attendings were always happy to mop. Just the ones that I enjoyed working with. But I wasn't shy about putting one into their hands and telling them that if they wanted the room turned over, I needed help. Maybe that is why I saw a lot of it.)

I hope you never see anything like that in your career. I'd love to find out that there are places where patient care is valued as much as it is given lip service.

 

[RogueUnicorn]

I don't understand Planes2Doc's posts.

it's a chronic issue for many

 

[Promethean]

. Bah... edit, reply, same thing, right?

 

[hach13]

.

 

[Dohnut]

Yeah it's not like you lied or falsified anything when you purposefully lied and falsified your hours

Lol. Reminds me of an earlier post about the OP's screen name being Metta World Peace but avatar being Malice in the Palace. I hate to judge but maybe that's the type of person the OP is. Healthcare professions are probably better off without him/her.


Edit: Hardcore NBA fan here, who never bought any NBA merchandise other than a Rockets jersey that says R. Artest on the back

 

[jl lin]

I was in a well-staffed hospital, but every now and again the nurses would be helping a patient and you'd be in the room anyway, and even though it wasn't your job, they might ask you for a boost, or to help turn a patient, or whatever, because if you help them you can ease that patient's discomfort in about ten seconds, whereas if they have to wait, it might take another fifteen or thirty minutes before another nurse or a CNA is available. I did a lot of things that weren't my job as an RT because they just made sense to help the patient and weren't that much of a bother, and I'm sure I'll end up doing a lot of those little tasks as a medical student and physician as well.

Yes, and that is quite different from cleaning up vomit, feces, blood, or taking out trash. LOL. Getting a boost is a reasonable thing, but I would say most attendings would look at a nurse or such with a major leer if asked to assist w/ such things. Guess I've worked in a ton of old school places.

There is also the unspoken risk of having been kind enough to assist this one time, it may become expected all the time. Of course, I think that is a bit of nonsense, and the real issue is the daily grind and scheduling demands for the number of patients and required tasks and duties. But there is a sense of an expectation that is a bit of an unspoken reality--that is, "That kind of thing is not a doctor's job, so don't get sucked into it; it's not what we went to school to do after all these years and dollars."

A rare few many have the gonads to say that outright, but most will observe the etiquette and are just worried about the burdensome load set before them, and if they will ever get home.

 

[Cotterpin]

This thread is so freaking depressing. Why do so many people apparently think volunteering is something they're doing for their own benefit?

 

[Dohnut]

I don't think anyone is claiming that these acts of empathy are Nobel Peace Prize worthy, or even worth mentioning at an interview. They're just anecdotes showing that 1) volunteering isn't a total waste of time and 2) nobody's too good to be nice.

Might I add that a small act of yours can mean the world to another person.

 

[jl lin]

This thread is so freaking depressing. Why do so many people apparently think volunteering is something they're doing for their own benefit?

Hopefully not singularly for one's own benefit, but in reality, is should be beneficial in the sense of insight, growth, maturity, etc.

 

[Psai]

This thread is so freaking depressing. Why do so many people apparently think volunteering is something they're doing for their own benefit?

Everything you do is for your own benefit.

 

[Cotterpin]

Hopefully not singularly for one's own benefit, but in reality, is should be beneficial in the sense of insight, growth, maturity, etc.

That's more of a nice side-effect than a reason.

Everything you do is for your own benefit.

Maybe everything you do is for your own benefit. Not everybody is like you.

 

[Psai]

That's more of a nice side-effect than a reason.



Maybe everything you do is for your own benefit. Not everybody is like you.

Yeah I'm sure you're breathing right now for your future patients' benefit

 

[Cotterpin]

Yeah I'm sure you're breathing right now for your future patients' benefit

What? How is that an argument? Dumb.