Volunteering at a hospice program?

[virtuoso735]

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I am considering volunteering at a hospice program, but it would not be at a nursing home/palliative care center. Instead, the program sends volunteers to patients' homes and have them help care for the patient by keeping them company, doing light housework, and other similar tasks. I think will volunteer for this since it only takes 4 hours a week, but I wouldn't really get to be a in hospital setting or have contact with physicians. Would this count as clinical experience? Would it be sufficient to do only this and not volunteer in a hospital?

 

[Isoprop]

I did the exact same thing and it did count as clinical experience. It even got brought up in interviews.

Not sure if it would substitute hospital volunteering because you don't really get to observe how physicians and other healthcare providers operate. But nobody asked or cared about my hospital volunteer work.

 

[DinoSaysRawr]

I did the exact same thing and it did count as clinical experience. It even got brought up in interviews.

Not sure if it would substitute hospital volunteering because you don't really get to observe how physicians and other healthcare providers operate. But nobody asked or cared about my hospital volunteer work.

I don't have any hospital volunteering. The head of the volunteering program said that it was really only for teenagers. 🙁 Is there someway to have shadowing as volunteer work in a hospital setting? (Sorry to hijack the thread OP! Hopefully this is beneficial to you as well if it gets answered.🙂)

 

[sector9]

I don't have any hospital volunteering. The head of the volunteering program said that it was really only for teenagers. 🙁 Is there someway to have shadowing as volunteer work in a hospital setting? (Sorry to hijack the thread OP! Hopefully this is beneficial to you as well if it gets answered.🙂)

Are you asking "Can shadowing count as volunteering?" If you are, then the answer is no. You aren't helping anyone with shadowing. You are observing

To the OP: Hospice is a great volunteer experience. It will be great on your app. However, it will not fill the expectations to have clinical exposure in a clinic and/or hospital. You might be able to get away with doing hospice volunteering+lots of shadowing, but I would tell you to see if you can do all three: hospice volunteering (which is kind of a gray area between clinical volunteering and nonclinical volunteering), hospital volunteering, and shadowing

 

[virtuoso735]

I will do the hospice/home care volunteering then. I'm still waiting to get a volunteering position at a hospital, but it is literally taking FOREVER for any of them to respond. I must have applied to 6 hospitals already but only one of them have gotten back to me, and they told me I had to wait 3 months for an interview!

 

[LizzyM]

As an alternative to a hospital, try a free clinic or public clinic in your area if you have one. Where would locals go for confidential testing and treatment of sexually transmitted infections, for example?

Another option is to shadow/assist in a a doctor's office, particularly if they do a fair amount of procedures in the office (family practice, GI, GYN, urology). The vast majority of medical care is delivered in ambulatory care settings so spending some time in that setting is not unreasonable.

 

[ucsfstudents]

This sounds like it will be a great experience. Regardless of whether you list it is clinical experience or volunteer experience or something else, you should try to put it only under one. Premeds tend to have a hard time getting clinical experiences so I would put it under that one. But you still have to shadow physicians and see what it is like for them to practice medicine, i.e. get an idea of what you're getting yourself into.