General Admissions & OTCAS Shadowing Hours

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xmc2015x

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I'm sure that this is probably in the forum somewhere and I did attempt to search for it but the other questions didn't seem exactly the same. Anyways, I graduated this past Spring with no idea what I wanted to go to grad school for but have finally decided that I would like to go into Occupational Therapy. My only issue is that when compared with people who have years of experience and hundreds of hours of observation, I'll look like I wasn't really trying that hard. My hope is to get a decent amount of hours by summer/fall 2016 but I know the process is so competitive and many schools would prefer people with a greater amount of experience.

I was just curious if anyone was in the same situation and crammed a lot of hours into a shorter amount of time or simply made the cut with the minimum number of hours they asked for (ranging from about 20-80). Thanks for any help!
 
This doesn't answer your question but I don't think it's so much the number of hours but what is gained from them. People with more hours ideally would have a better idea of what is OT but that isn't always the case. It's more important how you convey your experience and understanding of your fit into OT (shadowing and non-shadowing). Even more important would be your letter of recommendation from your occupational therapy practitioner(s). Non-OT experience also shapes you and may have weight in your application.If you hit the minimum hours and satisfy everything else, then I wouldn't stress about it.
 
I had 100 hours in 9 or 10 months and got accepted. I had some weeks with 20 hours and then months with 0 hours... I'm not positive about what schools want, but I don't think they care much about how long it took you to get your hours.

I would suggest getting hours in several different settings. This shows your familiarity with different populations and work environments within that you have open to you as an OT. In an interview or your personal statement you have more to talk about than many many hours in one or two settings.

If getting hours may be difficult due to school/work/weekday commitments, I've seen a lot of skilled nursing places have OTs working Saturday. To get lots of hours at once, I've seen hand clinics have days where they work 7 AM to 6 PM.
 
Doesnt matter if you have hours over years or just got them all in one summer just make sure you get OVER whatever the school wants... so if the school says 60 hours try to get 100. And definitely do AT LEAST two setting... but the more settings the better!! I had like 90 hours, but i did them in four settings (inpatient, outpateint, geriatrics and peds) so i think that helped. But for inpatients/outpatients I only did like 10-15 hours, so it doesn't have to be a lot of hours in all the settings, but just enough to say thay you got something out of it. I would say get at least 10-20 in one settings before changing to a different one. Also, take a look at the schools you are applying to and see what they require... i know that one place that i looked at said u had to have 20hrs in a setting for it to count. Schools are all different.
 
I have like 30 hours, combining a hospital setting and an outpatient rehab setting. Only one program I'm applying to requires it and they only required 20 hours.
I stupidly did not get signatures from anyone saying I shadowed them, no there is no proof now. So, I basically have to start over next year if I don't get accepted this time around. I'm in the same boat. :/
 
It was never brought up during 2 interviews (1 accept 1 defer/waitlist). I had 60 hours crammed in a short period of time and another 20 or 30 spread throughout 1 year.
 
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