Will research interviews of addiction clients qualify as clinical experience?

[ButAtYourBest]

I am going to be involved with a clinical research project....mostly I will be interviewing and administering the addiction severity index to patients in a longitudinal study. They are looking at a lot of variables, like psycho-social things, sexual risk behavior, etc.

Will this help a med school application, in terms of clinical experience? We are not administering treatment per se, although the clients were recruited from an affiliated out-patient rehabilitation clinic. So I may be able to get involved with the clinic itself, too.

It is definitely a research project, HOWEVER, since I will be (eventually independently) administering the index/survey instrument and interviewing clients, i imagine it is more clinically oriented than other types of research projects. Will the interviews be viewed as "patient interaction"?

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[Mattabet]

While it sounds clinical, I'm not really sure that it is medical. It really depends on the nature of the treatment that will be going on. Certainly it could be anywhere on a spectrum between psychology and psychiatry, depending on the nature of the treatment. I think it's a good experience, but I wouldn't count on it for your entire clinical experience - for that you're going to want to see some strictly medical patients.

 

[ButAtYourBest]

yeah...some of them will be doing the out-patient treatment...but i won't be really involved with the administration of it. just recording and analyzing the results of it from a research perspective

 

[red10]

yeah...some of them will be doing the out-patient treatment...but i won't be really involved with the administration of it. just recording and analyzing the results of it from a research perspective

sounds like clinical research but not clinical experience. Still sounds like a valuable experience though

 

[ButAtYourBest]

Yeah...it sounds like a project I could get really into...but at this stage, i probably should focus on strictly clinical experience, since i have none. and i already have research experience.

Are there guidelines somewhere for the type/amount of clinical experience required by med schools?

 

[red10]

Yeah...it sounds like a project I could get really into...but at this stage, i probably should focus on strictly clinical experience, since i have none. and i already have research experience.

Are there guidelines somewhere for the type/amount of clinical experience required by med schools?

more=better

 

[Mattabet]

I know LizzyM's line on clinical experience is that if you're close enough to smell patients, it's clinical.

Your problem is just that they're not strictly medical patients. It's my impression that adcoms want to see that you know what an MD (or DO) does; that you know where the Medical Doctor fits into the overall healthcare melange. If you're working with a psychiatrist on this project, it probably helps somewhat. You can make sure all your bases are covered by going and doing something at a hospital where you can see medicine in action.

 

[ButAtYourBest]

yeah....i think i would be working most closely with a PHD...not an MD

sigh...i guess i need to find something else

 

[CCLCMer]

yeah....i think i would be working most closely with a PHD...not an MD

sigh...i guess i need to find something else

You should still do this project if you like it. (It sounds pretty cool to me too.) But yeah, you need to get some shadowing in, too. Why don't you volunteer at the clinic that's doing your study?