Need some advice from med students

[kimt2234]

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Hello gang

I am usually hanging out with the premed's (since I am one) but I wanted to get some feedback on an issue that is a bit confusing. It has to do with volunteer/work experience. How much is enough? What type of experiences do admissions committees look for in people they admit?

I just recentlly met with the associate dean at my local med school and part of our meeting consisted of her probing into my volunteer and work experience thus far. Let me break down what I have so far and what was just recently offerred so i can get some advice as to whether or not this is the best track to be on...

I have a BS in Psych and a Master's in Marriage and Family Therapy. I spent three months after graduating from my undergrad working with victims of domestic violence threw the District Attorney's office and was hired on from a volunteer for another 9 months (I was let go because it was an LTE position). Then, while working for the DA's office, I applied for my two year Master's program and began volunteering for a 24 hour parental stress line (which I did a few shifts a month, but slowly digressed to fewer and fewer shifts because of the graduate load). I did that from Feb. 2003 till May of 2005.

As for hospital experience, I worked as a Mental Health Specialist for two years on the child/adolescent psychiatric unit and worked directly with patients and an interdisciplinary team from May 2003 till May 2005.

The assistant dean said I needed to volunteer or work on a medical unit to gain more experience. (What is the psych unit I ask you?) I was just offerred a part-time position today as the Health Unit Coordiantor on the Neurosciences Unit of a local hospital. Should I take it? Would that aide in satisfying the work/volunteer portion of my application? I am applying for fall 2008 admission.

Do they prefer volunteer work over paid medical experience? What about this new position in addition to what I have already for work/volunteer experience?
Would this make me a qualified candidate in the work/volunteer section?

The reason I ask such specific questions is that some premed's and re-applicant did volunteer or paid work as EMT's or on various hospital units and that still didn't seem like enough to admissions committees. Plus, the volunteers at hospitals and such said they spent of their time reading because they couldn't do much outside of delivering food trays or changing bed linens. I don't want my experience to be like that!

Thanks for reading and for any feedback you may have for someone who got a graduate degree to become a psychotherapist and two weeks after graduation decided to pursue med school.

 

[WhoisJohnGalt]

The assistant dean said I needed to volunteer or work on a medical unit to gain more experience. (What is the psych unit I ask you?) I was just offerred a part-time position today as the Health Unit Coordiantor on the Neurosciences Unit of a local hospital. Should I take it? Would that aide in satisfying the work/volunteer portion of my application? I am applying for fall 2008 admission.

Do they prefer volunteer work over paid medical experience? What about this new position in addition to what I have already for work/volunteer experience?
Would this make me a qualified candidate in the work/volunteer section?

The reason I ask such specific questions is that some premed's and re-applicant did volunteer or paid work as EMT's or on various hospital units and that still didn't seem like enough to admissions committees. Plus, the volunteers at hospitals and such said they spent of their time reading because they couldn't do much outside of delivering food trays or changing bed linens. I don't want my experience to be like that!

Thanks for reading and for any feedback you may have for someone who got a graduate degree to become a psychotherapist and two weeks after graduation decided to pursue med school.

I know this isn't what you want to hear, but do what your dean says. If s/he says you need to do more volunteer work, do it. We all got in for different reasons. Some of us had volunteer experience, some of us had killer MCAT scores. No one is going to have a definitive answer to this question, because we don't know where you're applying, we don't know your stats, etc. Volunteer work will certainly bolster low MCAT/GPA, but you may not need it-- your premed advisors are much better suited to help you determine this than we are.

As for the HUC position, I think that shadowing would look better than HUCing. This has nothing to do with compensation, but rather that HUCs, while INCREDIBLY useful people that we are all glad to have, do very little in the way of actual medical work; they are essentially administrative assistants. I'm not knocking HUCs at all-- the hospital wouldn't function without them-- but I don't think it'll convince an admissions committee that you know what being a physician is all about. Shadowing a doc and watching procedures will be much more beneficial in that respect. Best of luck!

 

[kimt2234]

I know this isn't what you want to hear, but do what your dean says. If s/he says you need to do more volunteer work, do it. We all got in for different reasons. Some of us had volunteer experience, some of us had killer MCAT scores. No one is going to have a definitive answer to this question, because we don't know where you're applying, we don't know your stats, etc. Volunteer work will certainly bolster low MCAT/GPA, but you may not need it-- your premed advisors are much better suited to help you determine this than we are.

As for the HUC position, I think that shadowing would look better than HUCing. This has nothing to do with compensation, but rather that HUCs, while INCREDIBLY useful people that we are all glad to have, do very little in the way of actual medical work; they are essentially administrative assistants. I'm not knocking HUCs at all-- the hospital wouldn't function without them-- but I don't think it'll convince an admissions committee that you know what being a physician is all about. Shadowing a doc and watching procedures will be much more beneficial in that respect. Best of luck!

Thank you for responding and for directing me to resources that can help. Much Appreciated