Shadowing opportunities in rural areas

[ladymiresa]

I attend a university in rural midwest. I really want to build my shadowing hours and see what it's really like to work with patients, but I'm struggling to find the opportunities to do this. There is one hospital here in my town and nearly all of the doctors are DOs. I'd like to round out my experiences by working with some MDs, too, but they're hard to find around here. I've tried to reach out to the private practices in the area but they've rejected me because "if we let you shadow, all the undergrads will want to shadow and we can't handle that" (It's a college town).

Does anyone have any suggestions? I've tried to set up times over breaks in larger cities but the success with this has been limited. Last summer and this upcoming summer I've spent doing research. I hope to gain some shadowing experience this summer but I don't want all my experiences to be clumped into summers, I'd rather have a distribution... I wish I had thought of things like this when I decided to go to college in a rural town!

Thanks!

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[raiderette]

I had the same situation, and my best success came from finding alums through the career center and through m sorority. I also reached out to my hometown contacts. Still, if you need to shadow a physician, a DO will not hurt you.

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[ladymiresa]

I hadn't considered contacting the career center... I'll try to do that this week! Thanks! I'm also in a sorority so I'll reach out to some of our national connections...

I'm more than happy to shadow DOs and actually the research I did last summer was at an osteopathic school. I just don't want this to be my only experiences and then, when I apply MD, I look like I'm in the wrong program!

 

[rotarman]

How rural are you? Why not just call all the docs in a 50 mile radius and ask to shadow? The most formative shadowing experience I had was with an office I cold called. Call around to all the different family practice/ specialty offices.

 

[LizzyM]

Also consider reaching out to your school's alumni office to identify alumni who have gone on to become physicians. They can do something for their school by providing opportunities for current students to shadow. One school made this a formal program to engage their alumni beyond just giving donations. I also recall a school that arranged for students to have a home stay with a rural physician during a school break (winter break, maybe?) and 40-80 hours of shadowing in one week.

Also, it isn't bad to have your shadowing be in the summers.

 

[raiderette]

Also, when applying MD you list your experience, not necessarily the degree. Physician letters don't mean much for MD but a DO letter is a requirement at many DO schools. Good luck!

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