Will old clinical experience still be applicable?

[remo]

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I had tons of clinical exp 12 years ago (summer as volunteer and then worked for about 2 years as phlebotomist and EKG tech) as an undergrad. So here I am 12 years later and finally going to apply to med school this summer. All aspects of my app are strong except the clinical exp. I have done a little volunteering over the past 6 months and I have surgeon that I will start to shadow next month but I have been focusing on grades, MCAT, LOR's and research. Do you think my experience so far is enough or will it be a problem? Also, one of my professors said that it might appear negative that I had all that clinical exp as an undergrad and then went into business instead (due to a slow start as an undergrad I probably wouldn't have been able to get in med school at the time). He thinks that could be a weakness in my app. Do you think that is possible?

 

[Law2Doc]

I had tons of clinical exp 12 years ago (summer as volunteer and then worked for about 2 years as phlebotomist and EKG tech) as an undergrad. So here I am 12 years later and finally going to apply to med school this summer. All aspects of my app are strong except the clinical exp. I have done a little volunteering over the past 6 months and I have surgeon that I will start to shadow next month but I have been focusing on grades, MCAT, LOR's and research. Do you think my experience so far is enough or will it be a problem? Also, one of my professors said that it might appear negative that I had all that clinical exp as an undergrad and then went into business instead (due to a slow start as an undergrad I probably wouldn't have been able to get in med school at the time). He thinks that could be a weakness in my app. Do you think that is possible?

Clinical experience is important to adcoms for two reasons: (1) to show you know something about the field you are getting into, and (2) to show interest in the field. Having stopped all clinical experience 12 years ago could look like a lack of interest in the field. Probably not fatal, given your more recent volunteering and anticipated shadowing. But certainly you want to squeeze in as much current exposure to medicine as you can between now and the application/interview time.

 

[relentless11]

In addition the clinical exposure, I've been told volunteering in a hospital also shows your desire to help the community. "Everyone and their mom" has done volunteering at the hospital, its just given that applicants have this experience, but it is my impression that adcoms would like you to not limit yourself in this area and include many other things that involve helping the community.

Another weird area is if you are doing clinical research. This is where I fall in, I spend my free weekdays at our hospital to recruit ICU and ER patients for my thesis project. Its definately clinical exposure, but certainly not volunteering. The last time i volunteered at the hospital was back in 2001. My guess is its probably good to do some more of this before I apply.

Something to also ask about is how to provide hard evidence of these experiences. I believe all you do on AMCAS is list your experiences and that is it. These experiences may carry more weight (relatively speaking) if there was some sort of transcript notation, and/or included in letters of recommendation. For instance shadowing a physician will be taken as a grain of salt if its just listed on the application. However if this is reinforced by a letter of rec from this physician, it would probably be better. Just something to think about when picking your extracurriculars.

 

[Law2Doc]

Another weird area is if you are doing clinical research. This is where I fall in, I spend my free weekdays at our hospital to recruit ICU and ER patients for my thesis project. Its definately clinical exposure, but certainly not volunteering. The last time i volunteered at the hospital was back in 2001. My guess is its probably good to do some more of this before I apply.

Just be careful to have other clinical exposure besides clinical research, as I was told in passing on one interview that the adcom considered clinical research to exclusively be "research", not "clinical" experience.

 

[relentless11]

Yea I agree, I'll just have to put on the ole volunteer ID badge again. Nothing wrong with that, just gotta finish this thesis first..haha. Thanks for the feedback! 🙂