<p>Personal Statements</p>
<p>As far as hours go, I’d be comfortable applying with 60-75, more confident with 100, and knowing for sure I’ve “checked” the shadowing box with 150-200. But that’s just a rough estimate. I think it’s more important for her to find a good fit so she can pay attention to various aspects of patient care–everything from what the flow through clinic is like, how docs and the rest of the team approach complicated clinical problems, what techniques they use to deliver bad news or work through difficult issues (even things as boring as logistics–how can we get all this stuff done in one visit so the patient doesn’t have to travel hundreds of miles twice?), how the team interacts with each other, how satisfied the doc seems with his/her life and career, etc. I’m not convinced the point of shadowing is to figure out what specialty you’re interested in; I think the point is more to figure out if this field is the right one for you. When choosing someone to shadow, I’d much rather shadow someone in an obscure specialty who seems eager to share/teach students than I would be to get to scrub in on some cool-sounding surgical case (not to say shadowing surgeons is a bad idea. I just think “observing surgery” isn’t necessarily the goal of all shadowing experiences.). </p>
<p>My approach was to find 2 docs to build relationships with–I shadowed each of them about once a week for two school years, and did research with one of them–and then shadow in a variety of specialties just for the fun of it (spent 1-2 days with 3-4 other docs). </p>
<p>I think it paid off quite well–both wrote allegedly outstanding rec letters for me, and the surgeon I worked with was actually my first attending on my third-year surgery rotation. </p>
<p>Just my two cents. Approach to shadowing definitely varies by person though. This way just worked for me.</p>
<p>Thanks Kristin and Mcat. </p>
<p>Since there seems to be so much variation in the hours, is there any documentation needed during the application process for validation, i.e., does one need provide signed documents for these hours?</p>
<p>Both D1 and D2 applied/is applying with fewer hours than what kristin suggests. (Around 30 hours maybe?) But each had other significant medical activities. D1 was a working EMT-I; D2 has 1000+ hours of direct patient contact from her various research experiences.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>RE: documentation. She doesn’t need to provide signed documents, but she needs to be able to provide a name and contact information (phone, address, email) for someone who can verify that she did indeed engage in the activity she’s claims on her application.</p>
<p>AMCAS doesn’t verify activities, but medical schools do random (and not so random) spot checks.</p>
<p>Are we talking about hours for shadowing or hours for clinical experience (e.g., volunteering in hospitals)? I think DS had quite many hours on the latter, but had a big fat zero hour on the former. He was shadowing doctors AFTER he had been in med school. Maybe he’s an outlier here.</p>
<p>As regards to what activities paid off well, i think DS had done two things that paid off well:</p>
<p>1) His active involvement with club a few and their associated charities. When he filled out application, he said he could easily find something to put in because of these activities over 4 years. This might not be surprising for a person like him who once said the thing he values the most thing is the ECs in the evening.
2) His research in his glide year. He did not ask his PI to write any LOR officially. But in one day, out of the blue, the PI asked him what schools he had applied and had got in, as well as his stats (kind of odd that a PI would ask his stats only after DS had been in his research group for months already) and nothing else. Right then and there, he wrote and sent some emails to bat for him. It was his lucky day.</p>
<p>Mcat - so your son had some admissions in hand and he wrote to the rest?</p>
<p>I only heard of this from DS. He had had all required LORs submitted to his own college’s premed committee and the commitee had sent out the combined packets to all med schools in his applied list of schools. This happened at the beginning of the application cycle.</p>
<p>The PI wrote some emails on behalf of him after his short conversation with DS on a much later date and likely to very few schools only. I believe DS actually did not know which schools this PI wrote to and what he wrote ( per “LOR writing tradition” - the student should not know what the letter writer wrote,).
I guess his PI must know how to do this (extra LOR.) as he seems to know many people in that community. Every year, his research group actually regularly visited several other research groups (and they treat them well like feed them during the visit) and several of these other research groups visit them also and his research group return the favor by treating them well.) I guess this may be connections between them within the research circle in that area.</p>
<p>0 shadowing hours would be an outlier among the med students I know. 1000+ clinical hours would, in my opinion, show plenty of dedication such that 30h shadowing makes sense. (I didn’t have thousands of clinical hours, but made up for it by having lots of shadowing hours.)</p>
<p>First day of psych. D. was actually looking forward to this one (at the great place also), so happy to be done with the surgery, but almost liked the VA emergency.
For a change, she will have both Sat. and Sun. off for psych, but not for neuro.</p>
<p>D1 starts surgery today. She looking forward to it, but anxious at the same time since she’s seriously interested in a surgical specialty.</p>
<p>D1’s surgical rotation site is <500 yards from where I work. Maybe we’ll be able to get together for lunch while she’s there.</p>
<p>^From what I’ve heard about surgery rotations, don’t count on it.</p>
<p>Oh iwbb you might be kinda melodramatic. Or my surg rotation was easy. Or both. Regardless, Id be pretty shocked if she never had a break for breakfast, lunch, or an afternoon snack. But why stop there? Happy hour would probably be best…</p>
<p>How about a need for midnight chicken soup from mommy?</p>
<p>D1 said we would probably have to eat in the hospital caf instead of going across the street to Cervante’s for enchiladas, but, hey, I’ve eaten worse places. </p>
<p>And this time of year–it’s green chile corn chowder, texaspg, not chicken noodle. Sent D1 home with a quart of it Sunday evening after she & her SO came over to watch Breaking Bad. </p>
<p>BTW, BB has filmed more than one ep at the hospital where D1 will be doing her rotation. Everyone at work went out, at one point or another, to stand in the parking lot and watch the TV show being shot. (It’s not nearly as interesting as one might think.)</p>
<p>BB is…breaking bad? (I’m so far behind on pop culture knowledge and politics it’s pathetic. I noticed the Miley Cyrus/VMA fiasco the next morning on a pt’s muted TV tuned to Fox News…)</p>
<p>BB = Breaking Bad (AMC, Sunday evenings, fifth and final season, only 4 episodes left to go.)</p>
<p>D1’s former roomate dated Aaron Paul (who plays Jesse Pinkman) very, very briefly. </p>
<p>Bryan Cranston (who once upon a time was Malcolm in Middle’s hapless dad) is Walter White, a high school chem teacher turn meth cooker and drug lord. </p>
<p>LOL, the high school Walt supposedly taught at, JP Wynne High School, doesn’t exist in reality. However, the one they used for location shots is the one D1 graduated from and is about 1 mi. down the street.</p>
<p>There are Breaking Bad tours around town and we get tourists who come from all over the US and Europe to see the places where the show has been shot.</p>
<p>"And this time of year–it’s green chile corn chowder, texaspg, not chicken noodle. "</p>
<p>I guess any soup will do when you are tired after a 12 hour surgery and you want mommy to bring soup. :D</p>
<p>Correct - NO “break for breakfast, lunch, or an afternoon snack” during surgery rotations, no breaks for having gulp of water - harder than food as they cary protein bars in thier pockets, but cannot cary water bottles (not sure about bathroom procedure, but surgions themselves do NOT have bathroom breaks during surgery even if surgery is 10 hours - noted by my D. who thought that surgeions are different species alltogether, emotionally, physically, attitude wise,…etc. )
Also, exam at the end of Surgery Rotation was much much harder than Step 1, not comparable. Do not know about others, since Surgery was D’s 2hd after Research (no exam).</p>
<p>^To contrast that experience: surgery was my first rotation after Step 1, and my schedule was manageable at the time but looking back was kind of crazy. I’d say my long days were 5:30a-6p, more average days were 6a-4:30p, and the lightest days were 7-4:30 with a break from 1:30-3:30. Overnights were usually 5p-7a and most nights I slept 2a-6a. I never had trouble finding time to eat breakfast (in between morning rounds and morning cases or clinic), I usually had a lunch break or at least a chance to sit down and eat some granola bars (gotta love those 7 pocket white coats!), and I was often home by a relatively normal dinner time.</p>
<p>I don’t know what exam Miami’s D took, but we took the NBME shelf exam, and I thought it was comparable to my exams during my preclinical years (maybe easier…) and similar on average to step 1. I don’t know anyone who thought it was much much harder. (Obviously, her step 1 could have been on a different date and thus an entirely different beast than mine).</p>
<p>Just wanted to toss in another perspective. Glad to hear she’s doing well!</p>