Medical Should I take a break from lab?

[Mr.Smile12]

Hello,

I joined a research lab last July and I have about 50 hours there so far. I have also had the opportunity to design my own project and I was awarded a fellowship from it and presented a poster based on this. I may be getting a publication. This upcoming semester, I am taking an EMT course which I believe will be very time consuming. I am also taking Organic Chemistry 2 and Genetics. My question is, based on my research experience so far, would it be reasonable to ask for a one semester break from my lab? I would eventually like to get a Letter of Recommendation from my lab PI so I don't want to burn any bridges. I feel like doing the EMT course along with volunteering with my EMT squad and managing my classes is already a lot.

Do you have any other clinical experience? Obviously your EMT training helps get you to have experience (meaning it can't count as experience).

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[GoSpursGo]

Yes, I have 70 hours of volunteering at a Children's hospital and 50 hours shadowing a cardiologist. But both of these activities stopped in March of last year because of COVID. I don't have anything else clinical related, EMT is going to be my big one as I am applying in two years.

You won’t burn any bridges based on this.

you need to balance your priorities. No amount of research will counterbalance a subpar performance in classes.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Getting clinical experience> research experience. You can have 8090 hours of research but won’t get into medical school without clinical work.