Is it okay to have no "volunteering"

[GBCrzzyy]

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I mean, I got my volunteering in. But it was in a project that I actually cared about and could make a difference in, because I just don't much give a damn about a spending an hour doing something that is less useful to society than my one hour at work would have been. Like, why spend four hours working at a food kitchen when I could spend those four hours saving lives while earning money I could give to the food kitchen instead. They always needed money far more than workers, and four hours of my pay could feed three dozen families for an evening. I'm big on donating my money, but time- well, it has to be an activity where I'm actually making enough of a difference for it to be worth the sacrifice of both the money I would have earned and the good I could have done at my day job. Such opportunities are hard to find, but I did eventually find one helping to operate the supply side of medical missions to Africa and South America.

I guess one could say I've got a utilitarian view on volunteering- one should do the math and not just blindly give their time.

I have a lot of volunteering experience and there are many places that function almost entirely on volunteers so a volunteer is worth far more than money is. I spent time as a volunteer firefighter and volunteering to work with wildlife at a rehab center. You can donate all the money you want to those places but if there is no one volunteering, the money won't be used anyways. And it always looks good to show that you are self sacrificing enough to give your time and energy to someone that needs it. Especially since as a resident, with the low pay, it's going to feel much more like you're donating your time than anything else. I suggest finding a place to actually put in the work as a volunteer but that's just my take on it. Anyone can donate money but not everyone will spend hours of their time volunteering.

 

[Mad Jack]

I have a lot of volunteering experience and there are many places that function almost entirely on volunteers so a volunteer is worth far more than money is. I spent time as a volunteer firefighter and volunteering to work with wildlife at a rehab center. You can donate all the money you want to those places but if there is no one volunteering, the money won't be used anyways. And it always looks good to show that you are self sacrificing enough to give your time and energy to someone that needs it. Especially since as a resident, with the low pay, it's going to feel much more like you're donating your time than anything else. I suggest finding a place to actually put in the work as a volunteer but that's just my take on it. Anyone can donate money but not everyone will spend hours of their time volunteering.

It was more a lack of opportunities that I could actually make a decent difference in. There just aren't a lot of them in areas I truly care about in my state, so it made things difficult. The biggest things I'm into (education/tutoring and volunteer medical services) either were not available on a schedule that matched my own (it's hard to volunteer when you're working/going to school seven days a week) or required different qualifications than I possessed (EMS volunteers all require an EMT course, for instance, which I had neither the time nor funds to complete, most medical volunteering positions required nursing experience, etc). Now I've got plenty of time for that sort of thing, probably going to do a lot of volunteering on the free care bus during weekends this year. But, like I said, I did find a position that I was passionate about and worked for me, it just took a lot of looking.

 

[CyrilFiggis]

Yes. Without a doubt you need more volunteering. It's a bull**** metric, but everyone else you're competing against is doing it, and they're also massively inflating (i.e. lying) their hours too.

It's not that hard to get 1,000+ hours over the course of an undergrad experience. I'm sure some inflate their numbers, but every clinical program I've done required at least 200 hours. [4 hours/week x 50 weeks]

 

[LizzyM]

I have a lot of volunteering experience and there are many places that function almost entirely on volunteers so a volunteer is worth far more than money is. I spent time as a volunteer firefighter and volunteering to work with wildlife at a rehab center. You can donate all the money you want to those places but if there is no one volunteering, the money won't be used anyways. And it always looks good to show that you are self sacrificing enough to give your time and energy to someone that needs it. Especially since as a resident, with the low pay, it's going to feel much more like you're donating your time than anything else. I suggest finding a place to actually put in the work as a volunteer but that's just my take on it. Anyone can donate money but not everyone will spend hours of their time volunteering.

I agree and as is often said, the volunteer gets as much or more out of it than the person served. One of my annual volunteer activities through a group I belong to is a school supply drive for poor kids in my area. We solicit tax-deductible donations, acquire school supplies, set up a "store" and invite kids and their parents to come in and fill a backpack with needed materials. We've even vetted requests for graphing calculators for kids in HS & CC for whom the $80 price tag is beyond anything the family can afford. Sure we need money but nothing happens unless volunteers step up. Our volunteers include highly paid professionals who know that money can't buy the priceless looks on the faces of the kids as they choose a brightly colored backpack, fill it with school supplies and head out the door full of hope and enthusiasm.

 

[Tenk]

Unfortunately for some reason medical schools think that volunteering provides some kind of true medical experience (many do not: back in the day, I've seen plenty of people who just sit in a room playing cards or are given absolutely meaningless tasks that have nothing to do with patients). For this reason you need to volunteer. It's a game, if you want to win, you have to play the game.

I would recommend trying these:

1) Volunteering at a big children's hospital. The reason for this is that it can be kinda fun. You can literally just walk around and play video games with kids or draw or play games with them. It makes their days a lot more fun and gives their parents a VERY needed rest. You will actually make a difference in these hospitals. You will be useful. This makes it rewarding.

2) Volunteering in an ER. Due to the nature of an ER, volunteering at an ER can pretty much be considered shadowing as well imo. Just tell the docs you are a premed and usually they will talk to you about stuff. It's just our nature, we're generally friendly.

I did some other volunteering as a pre-med but it was all stupid, useless, meaningless crap that had nothing to do with medicine and just another hoop to jump through. Those two were the only ones that were beneficial to my future career mostly because it made me love EM.

Good luck.

 

[LoveBeingHuman:)]

If one has paid patient contact experience, then I feel one can skip that aspect of volunteering. Non-clinical volunteering is still important. Combat medics or Navy corpsmen get passes on both in my book.

One more thing: people who have a checkbox mentality towards these things usually show it in interviews, to their detriment.

I'm a bit shy and quiet. Will it come off as checkbox mentality since my answers during the interview will most likely be short?

 

[Goro]

No, you'll be dinged for a other set of deficits.
🙄

I'm a bit shy and quiet. Will it come off as checkbox mentality since my answers during the interview will most likely be short?

 

[LoveBeingHuman:)]

No, you'll be dinged for a other set of deficits.
🙄

I'm really nice in person 🙁 I promise!

 

[Goro]

Your post history says something else.

I'm really nice in person 🙁 I promise!

 

[TaupePremed]

Do med schools screen people out with less than 100 hours of physician shadowing?

Do I need to hustle and push my total past a certain milestone?

In reply to the OP: You definitely need volunteering, and it definitely is a reasonable requirement. I think it is silly that it is not an OFFICIAL requirement. It is not an unspoken requirement, it is very often spoken of, but it is not official for some silly reason.

 

[LoveBeingHuman:)]

Your post history says something else.

I don't think anything I've posted really suggests that I'm a bad person. Does it suggest that I'm bored and wasteful of time? maybe

 

[Goro]

EDIT 40 hrs, not 150!!

Maybe U WA, which I think requires ~150 hours. But I'm hazy on the details.

I like to say that the ECs are not required, but they are necessary.

Do med schools screen people out with less than 100 hours of physician shadowing?

Do I need to hustle and push my total past a certain milestone?

In reply to the OP: You definitely need volunteering, and it definitely is a reasonable requirement. I think it is silly that it is not an OFFICIAL requirement. It is not an unspoken requirement, it is very often spoken of, but it is not official for some silly reason.

 

[Goro]

I'm thinking about other trolls now, and so I'll simply say that *****s or loose cannons aren't necessarily bad people either.

I don't think anything I've posted really suggests that I'm a bad person. Does it suggest that I'm bored and wasteful of time? maybe

 

[Pusheen]

It helps to do some research and donate your time to places that actually need your time more than your money. Education and tutoring can't be bought, someone has to be there to provide it. Same goes for comfort care for patients in hospice or poor inner-city hospitals. Ditto for teen mentoring programs.

 

[freak7]

Maybe U WA, which I think requires ~150 hours. But I'm hazy on the details.

"The UW School of Medicine recommends that applicants shadow for at least 40 hours in the U.S.
The 40 hours do not have to be with one physician or all in one week. In fact, shadowing multiple physicians over several months to years will give applicants an opportunity to explore not only different medical fields, but also to compare different practice settings and different physician"

You might be thinking of another school @Goro

 

[777137]

"The UW School of Medicine recommends that applicants shadow for at least 40 hours in the U.S.
The 40 hours do not have to be with one physician or all in one week. In fact, shadowing multiple physicians over several months to years will give applicants an opportunity to explore not only different medical fields, but also to compare different practice settings and different physician"

You might be thinking of another school @Goro

Ì was going to say, 150 seems excessive. I mean shadowing kinda sucks compared to a lot of the clinical experiences you can have. Not doing anything really isn't that fun.

 

[Goro]

I have no idea where the 150 came from. Will some of you go into Neurology and find a cure for that???!!

"The UW School of Medicine recommends that applicants shadow for at least 40 hours in the U.S.
The 40 hours do not have to be with one physician or all in one week. In fact, shadowing multiple physicians over several months to years will give applicants an opportunity to explore not only different medical fields, but also to compare different practice settings and different physician"

You might be thinking of another school @Goro

 

[LoveBeingHuman:)]

I didn't engage in such hyperbole, did I?

150 hrs of patient contact experience should suffice. But I have noticed a trend that acceptees to Top Schools have a lot more that that.

I have no idea where the 150 came from. Will some of you go into Neurology and find a cure for that???!!

You mentioned 150 hours in terms of clinical experience earlier so you probably still had that number stuck in your head!

 

[freak7]

You mentioned 150 hours in terms of clinical experience earlier so you probably still had that number stuck in your head!

Someone get this person a neuro fellowship.

 

[LoveBeingHuman:)]

Someone get this person a neuro fellowship.

I'm an observent person

 

[Stagg737]

Do med schools screen people out with less than 100 hours of physician shadowing?

Do I need to hustle and push my total past a certain milestone?

In reply to the OP: You definitely need volunteering, and it definitely is a reasonable requirement. I think it is silly that it is not an OFFICIAL requirement. It is not an unspoken requirement, it is very often spoken of, but it is not official for some silly reason.

It varies from school to school, but I don't think any place will screen for having less than 100. Example, my school adcom highly frowns upon applicants that don't have at least 50 hours. They feel that's the minimum to really get a feel for what a physician goes through on a day to day basis. As LizzyM said early in the thread, make sure your app shows you have experience in the field you say you want to enter. If you want to do research, you might not need shadowing on your app but you better be able to show you've done some legit research. If you want to do clinical med, you better have some solid patient exposure. Either way, shadowing is important so you know what you're getting yourself into and you don't end up as one of the many physicians who hate their career before they even finish residency.

 

[777137]

It varies from school to school, but I don't think any place will screen for having less than 100. Example, my school adcom highly frowns upon applicants that don't have at least 50 hours. They feel that's the minimum to really get a feel for what a physician goes through on a day to day basis. As LizzyM said early in the thread, make sure your app shows you have experience in the field you say you want to enter. If you want to do research, you might not need shadowing on your app but you better be able to show you've done some legit research. If you want to do clinical med, you better have some solid patient exposure. Either way, shadowing is important so you know what you're getting yourself into and you don't end up as one of the many physicians who hate their career before they even finish residency.

Do they consider scribing as an equivalent? Just wondering how different adcoms look at these kinds of activities.

 

[Goro]

I personally consider scribing to be the same as shadowing. Others will disagree.

Do they consider scribing as an equivalent? Just wondering how different adcoms look at these kinds of activities.

 

[Stagg737]

Do they consider scribing as an equivalent? Just wondering how different adcoms look at these kinds of activities.

Mostly agree with Goro. I think if you've got significant scribing it can replace clinical volunteering since you're having a lot of face to face contact with patients. You should still do some non-clinical volunteering to be safe though.

It also depends on your duties as a scribe. If you're doing it in the traditional sense (following a doc around and just taking notes), I agree it's more like paid shadowing. I talked to one friend that actually took patient histories for the doc before they came in and then stayed and took notes while the doc saw the patient. I think that would count as far more valuable clinical experience because it involves more interaction with the patient. Like Goro said though, it'll vary from school to school, just like what they want to see out of their applicants as a whole varies.