<p>i'm in suffolk county - long island, ny and i cannot seem to find any hospital that offers any sort of shadowing program. I've called my local hospital and they dont offer a program. I just graduated HS and i want to get some experience shadowing this summer before i go to college. Can anyone help me?</p>
<p>Try contacting individual doctors rather than hospitals. You could start with your primary care physician.</p>
<p>D used her connections - her friends parents, places where she used to volunteer, our family doc. with success. She has lined up 3 doc’s to shadow this summer.</p>
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<p>This is the best idea - start with your primary care physician or, if you have a particular specialty that you’re interested in, contact a local doc in that specialty. If you live near a university with a teaching hospital, doctors there tend to be used to students wanting to shadow. You’re better off with primary care docs (IM, FM, maybe peds) - if you shadow an OB/Gyn, for example, you’ll be standing outside the room more than anything - surgery is rather difficult to shadow as well since many hospitals have rules about who is allowed to be in the OR during surgeries.</p>
<p>Agree with all of the above. My daughter’s first shadowing experience was with the surgeon father of a friend of hers. She scrubbed in to 20-30 procedures. He has continued to be an incredible mentor. Her old pediatrician also offered.</p>
<p>I also agree with all of the above. I had to do a senior project before graduation and I wanted to shadow a doctor. So I asked around some of the students at my school since many of them have parents who are doctors and one of my friends in my biology class told me I could shadow her father, an OB/GYN. Now I am working in his office for the summer after he offered me a job and get to shadow him on several of his surgery days. However, I would suggest that you get together a nice resume, if you haven’t already. It’s always nice to be able to show off a nice, reliable background in the sciences even when not asked to do so (My mentor did).</p>
<p>Look for a medical explorers post by the Boy Scouts. They do all of the above with various disciplines. </p>
<p>For Long Island:
Medical Explorers-A monthly program sponsored by the Boy Scouts of America in collaboration with Stony Brook University Hospital. Health care professionals from different departments and services within University Hospital provide tours, lectures, and presentations for students in the program. Through this experience, students ages 14 to 20 are introduced to various health care professions. Meetings are held on the last Wednesday of every month, from October through May, from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
Call Michael Maione at (631) 444-2806 or e-mail him at
<a href=“mailto:mmaione@epo.hsc.sunysb.edu”>mmaione@epo.hsc.sunysb.edu</a>.</p>
<p>ah thanks everybody for your suggestions. I guess it would help if some of my friends’ parents were doctors. I’ll try calling up my pediatrician tomorrow… and </p>
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<p>this would be a pretty nice program if it was offered during the summer.</p>
<p>Also wanted to ask, is it common for students to shadow during the school year at their college? (Just if worst comes to worst and i cant find a doctor to shadow) If so, where do students usually shadow? At the school’s affiliated medschool/hospital?</p>
<p>You seem to imply that there are more “prestigious” places to shadow? This isn’t true. It doesn’t matter when you shadow, and I doubt admissions really care where (although you might want to try several different environments/specialties to get a better feel for the profession). The only reason you shadow is so you can see what medicine is really like and so the admissions committee knows you have had at least limited exposure to the field before you decided to commit 7+ years of your life to medical school and residency.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that shadowing is not just something to check off your list for getting into medical school. This is your opportunity to examine whether medicine is right for you. After shadowing, many people drop pre-med, and there are always those who shadow, don’t like it, and then decide to go to med school anyways. These people typically turn into unhappy doctors… If you shadow AND really see this profession as your purpose and as something you would enjoy doing, then go for it, but don’t let some “I have to do whatever it takes to get into medical school” mentality cloud your judgment of medicines fit, or lack of fit, for you.</p>
<p>Thanks. And yes i know this. Actually i have no exposure to medicine as of right now. I really want to shadow in order to see if i am interested in the field at all, before i commit to being premed in college. I dont quite understand the logic behind someone who shadows, doesnt like it, then continues to pursue a career in medicine. However this is not my intention at all, and i certainly do not have a “I have to do whatever it takes to get into med. school” mentality since I’m not even sure if medicine is what I want to do.</p>
<p>I’m not quite sure where you picked up the implication about “prestige” in shadowing from my previous post. I don’t even know how shadowing at one place versus another place could be more prestigious. I was just simply asking if it was common for students to shadow during the school year, and if a lot of students do shadow during the school year (as opposed to the summer), then where are they offered the opportunity. Uh thanks though.</p>