Scribing for no pay?

[chemdoctor]

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Just wondered what everyone’s thoughts were on scribing without pay. I want to do it as community service and am not in a position where I need employment. I also work as a lifeguard during the summer when I can do I have a bit of work experience.

What are your thoughts on scribing without pay? Is that even allowed? I’d still love to do it. Thank you. The doctor I wanted to do it for said it would be fine but I was wondering if it would look weird.

 

[CyrilFiggis]

There is no reason not to get paid. Scribing is scribing. Doing it for free does not count as community service. How about instead of lifeguarding and increasing your risk for skin cancer, you scribe and do volunteer work?

 

[altblue]

There is no reason not to get paid. Scribing is scribing. Doing it for free does not count as community service. How about instead of lifeguarding and increasing your risk for skin cancer, you scribe and do volunteer work?

+1 I'm looking at scribing jobs for my gap year, and I've found there's definitely a learning curve to it and a lot of training involved. I haven't seen any opportunities for volunteer scribing, I know ScribeAssist and ScribeAmerica are paid, and I'd imagine hospitals want scribes to be reliably on time and invested in their training....so scribes get paid to keep them coming

 

[Robin-jay]

lol you want to be paid as a scribe. I don't know what you think scribing is, but if a scribe job is needed for the physician in the first place, expect it to be fast-paced and stressful.

 

[E.Hemingway]

I both volunteered and worked as a scribe in college.

The paid scribing was in an ED and very fast paced and stressful. I learned a lot about ED medicine and enjoyed my time there, but, if not for the pay, I don’t think I would have done it.

The volunteer scribing was in a free clinic serving primarily the homeless, but also the working poor and anyone else with poor access to healthcare. It was much less stressful and I spent a considerable amount of time face-to-face with patients. I learned a lot about healthcare disparities and austere medicine. My experiences in that organization profoundly influenced my goals in medicine and I was more than happy to do that work unpaid.

So I think it depends on the context and your interests. If it’s a bona fide job in a big hospital, I wouldn’t do it for free. But if it’s an opportunity to serve your community, demonstrate altruism, and learn about underserved medicine, I highly recommend volunteering.

And if you’re working for a nonprofit or some sort of community clinic, it certainly is not true that “doing it for free does not count as community service.”

 

[LizzyM]

I don't believe that volunteering in a private medical office is, in any way, a community service. People are making a good living running such a clinic and they should pay their staff members and not 1) exploit vulnerable pre-meds who will work for free and 2) substitute volunteers for paid staff all while enriching themselves!

I might make an exception if the clinic is family owned and you are helping a parent with their practice.

If a clinic is a not-for-profit charitable organization operating with physicians as volunteers, then it is a community service, IMHO, to voluteer there as a pre-med but most of the time, even clinics that serve "the poor" are paying their employees at market rates and shouldn't be exploiting pre-meds.

 

[doc05]

Do NOT scribe for free. In case you don't understand, here's what happens:

Scribes help the physician document a better note, physician exam, etc, and thereby increase billing by increasing the E&M codes. Some of this is probably fraudulent, especially in ERs. You also speed things along and let them see more patients. As a result, they are making a ton more $$.

Don't scribe for free.

 

[Piglet2020]

You could be doing so many other things that will enrich your application than scribing for free. Besides, scribing has been overdone in the premed world, and if you tell schools you’re scribing for free to stand out, it’s not gonna work.

 

[ellia]

Will you be scribing at a private practice?

 

[MCATISEZ]

I don't believe that volunteering in a private medical office is, in any way, a community service. People are making a good living running such a clinic and they should pay their staff members and not 1) exploit vulnerable pre-meds who will work for free and 2) substitute volunteers for paid staff all while enriching themselves!

I might make an exception if the clinic is family owned and you are helping a parent with their practice.

If a clinic is a not-for-profit charitable organization operating with physicians as volunteers, then it is a community service, IMHO, to voluteer there as a pre-med but most of the time, even clinics that serve "the poor" are paying their employees at market rates and shouldn't be exploiting pre-meds.

I don’t understand. If it is a family owned clinic, you’d make an exception? As in, you would then consider this volunteerism? It’s good to help your family. It might be good experience (as might scribing for free) but I’m not sure how I would justify it as volunteerism at all.

On the other hand, I would likely feel exploited scribing for free. Volunteers and paid employees tend to be held to very different expectations!


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[Tenk]

Scribing is not a community service. It’s like having a chauffeur for a physician. All you’re doing is helping the physician not hate their life.

 

[LizzyM]

I don’t understand. If it is a family owned clinic, you’d make an exception? As in, you would then consider this volunteerism? It’s good to help your family. It might be good experience (as might scribing for free) but I’m not sure how I would justify it as volunteerism at all.

On the other hand, I would likely feel exploited scribing for free. Volunteers and paid employees tend to be held to very different expectations!


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If you work in a family business without drawing a paycheck, I would call it "other" rather than "volunteer" and describe the activity. For some applicants, this time should be accounted for as it can be significant. I say this for clinical and non-clinical settings (restaurants, retail stores, dry cleaners, etc).

 

[chemdoctor]

Wow. Thank you everyone for such amazing responses. Yeah it’s badically not the legit stressful scribing you guys have probably heard of. It’s more like what @E.Hemingway was talking about. It’s basically a Cali ic serving underserved populations and people with poor access to healthcare. It’s not in a big hospital or ED. I agree. It would be exploitation if I would be doing the latter for free.

It’s really not a stressful job. It’s just helping out as a “scribe” at an underserved clinic. I guess I can’t put it as “scribing” on AMCAS then right? I guess as @LizzyM said I’d have to list it as other. I mean it’s still scribing but I’d list it as volunteer scribing?

I’m really just helping the physician out with writing the stuff down. It’s not as much work as a full time scribe but it’s very similar just not as much stress and legit hard work.

What would I put on my app? Do you guys think this would help enrich my app? Thank you again for so many great responses.

 

[E.Hemingway]

Wow. Thank you everyone for such amazing responses. Yeah it’s badically not the legit stressful scribing you guys have probably heard of. It’s more like what @E.Hemingway was talking about. It’s basically a Cali ic serving underserved populations and people with poor access to healthcare. It’s not in a big hospital or ED. I agree. It would be exploitation if I would be doing the latter for free.

It’s really not a stressful job. It’s just helping out as a “scribe” at an underserved clinic. I guess I can’t put it as “scribing” on AMCAS then right? I guess as @LizzyM said I’d have to list it as other. I mean it’s still scribing but I’d list it as volunteer scribing?

I’m really just helping the physician out with writing the stuff down. It’s not as much work as a full time scribe but it’s very similar just not as much stress and legit hard work.

What would I put on my app? Do you guys think this would help enrich my app? Thank you again for so many great responses.

I categorized my volunteer scribing activity as “community service / volunteer - medical / clinical” on AMCAS, but I was working with a grassroots 501c3 nonprofit. It might be different if you’re working for a fixed clinic.

 

[jazzmetal]

Wow. Thank you everyone for such amazing responses. Yeah it’s badically not the legit stressful scribing you guys have probably heard of. It’s more like what @E.Hemingway was talking about. It’s basically a Cali ic serving underserved populations and people with poor access to healthcare. It’s not in a big hospital or ED. I agree. It would be exploitation if I would be doing the latter for free.

It’s really not a stressful job. It’s just helping out as a “scribe” at an underserved clinic. I guess I can’t put it as “scribing” on AMCAS then right? I guess as @LizzyM said I’d have to list it as other. I mean it’s still scribing but I’d list it as volunteer scribing?

I’m really just helping the physician out with writing the stuff down. It’s not as much work as a full time scribe but it’s very similar just not as much stress and legit hard work.

What would I put on my app? Do you guys think this would help enrich my app? Thank you again for so many great responses.

I volunteer-scribed at a public (city-run) clinic in my extremely underserved neighborhood. Did two 4-hour shifts per week for four months. I listed it as clinical volunteering. Yes, I think it would enrich your app for all the reasons @E.Hemingway so elegantly lays out. Our clinic had many HIV and drug-addicted patients who'd been able to establish primary care after our physicians reached out to them with a mobile clinic program. I got to see how receiving proper health care led to being clear-headed and stable enough to apply for and get placed in supportive housing - it was inspiring. I also learned about how terrible most electronic medical record systems are. Aside from learning about primary care for underserved populations and more about how a primary care practice operates, I got experience that could lead to a paid scribing position, which you can't always just walk into; I'd applied and been told I needed experience first. Also, many schools consider scribing equivalent to (or better than) shadowing, since you're learning exactly what a doctor does all day, so there's that benefit to your application too. I would do it. Sounds like you have a good connection and that you'd learn a lot.

 

[chemdoctor]

I volunteer-scribed at a public (city-run) clinic in my extremely underserved neighborhood. Did two 4-hour shifts per week for four months. I listed it as clinical volunteering. Yes, I think it would enrich your app for all the reasons @E.Hemingway so elegantly lays out. Our clinic had many HIV and drug-addicted patients who'd been able to establish primary care after our physicians reached out to them with a mobile clinic program. I got to see how receiving proper health care led to being clear-headed and stable enough to apply for and get placed in supportive housing - it was inspiring. I also learned about how terrible most electronic medical record systems are. Aside from learning about primary care for underserved populations and more about how a primary care practice operates, I got experience that could lead to a paid scribing position, which you can't always just walk into; I'd applied and been told I needed experience first. Also, many schools consider scribing equivalent to (or better than) shadowing, since you're learning exactly what a doctor does all day, so there's that benefit to your application too. I would do it. Sounds like you have a good connection and that you'd learn a lot.

That's what I'm thinking. It is something I really want to do and I feel like it would give me a different type of clinical experience. one that I haven't got before. I'm always open to trying different clinical experiences. I feel like not only would it enrich my app, but it would also show me personally what a doctor does because I'm pretty much writing down everything he says. I'm not too sure about the hours but I was thinking of dedicating a summer to it.