My pre-med son decided to take a gap year upon finishing his sophomore year in college. I’m new to all this, but what’d be a good way for someone like him to spend his gap year? Is a simple volunteer work at a local hospital good enough or should he be doing more? Oh, he’s been working and will continue to work as a pharm tech. In our small city, there doesn’t seem to be much “structured” opportunities other than a rather expensive EMT certification at a local city college that cost $3,500. In other words, any opportunities other than simple volunteering or something costing quite a bit, he’d have to be proactive and create his own opportunities, but that’s where he doesn’t know how to go about. Any suggestions?
Volunteering in a hospital or at any other clinical site** is fine. He should be looking for volunteer situations that place him into direct patient contact as much as possible, rather than administrative or office jobs.
**other places to gain patient contact experience–nursing home, long term rehab hospital, group home for the mentally or physically disabled, county health clinic or other free/low cost public health clinics, Planned Parenthood, Healthcare for the Homeless, hospice program, stand alone day surgery center, cancer treatment center, summer camps & programs for disabled children, daycare program for the elderly demented, suicide or rape hotlines.
Besides clinical volunteering or employment, he should get involved with other community service project(s) that serve the less fortunate in your community. Think things like-- soup kitchen, emergency food pantry, tutoring students from low SES neighborhoods, Special Olympics, Big Brother/Big Sister,
The price you cite for EMT-B training is outrageous! An EMT-B is not the be-all, end-all of clinical experience. Pre-meds can find clinical exposure opportunities without an EMT.
Some other employment ideas your son may want to pursue that are also useful for a pre-med hopeful–
medical scribe–these individuals accompany physicians during patient exams and enter data into the EMR system. You son should check with local medical offices/local hospital to see which EMR system they use and what company provides the scribes. He should apply directly to that company who will train him and place him.
CNA (certified nursing assistant)–shorter and less expensive training than EMT, readily employable at nursing home and other clinical sites.
This is a great, exactly the kind of response I was hoping with all the general ideas laid out for us to explore. Thank you!
If he gets a job as a medical scribe…or a CNA…he should be able to bank some money as well…which will help with your cost concerns on your other threads.
Yes, of course! 
@WayOutWestMom - “medical scribe–these individuals accompany physicians during patient exams and enter data into the EMR system. You son should check with local medical offices/local hospital to see which EMR system they use and what company provides the scribes. He should apply directly to that company who will train him and place him.”
We live in a rather small city, and it doesn’t seem like there’s any on-site programs where one can go to for training and the certification. Does it make any difference whether one obtains the medical scribe certification training ONLINE?
All EMR systems are not the same. They are proprietary and require training specific to the brand of software being used. (D1 and D2 have told me learning a new EMR system is major PITA that takes days or weeks to learn how to use. D2 refused to do away/audition rotations in MS4 partially because she didn’t want to have to learn an entirely new & different EMR system.)
There are a few online scribe training programs that teach medical terminology and ICD coding, but don’t train students in the use of specific software. I’d be leery of those.
Scribes usually do not work directly for the medical practice or hospital. The work for a medical scribe staffing company. A few hospitals/medical groups hire & train their own scribes, but this is less common.
If you have a PCP or a know a physician socially, you may want to ask them where they get their scribes or if they know who trains the scribes who work in the local ER. Or your son could contact local large group medical practices and the local hospital to see what company provides them with scribes.
ScribeAmerica, PhysAsst Scribes, ProScribe, Elite Medical Scribes, iScribes, Afillion, and about another dozen or so other companies are the big national scribe staffing services. There may also be local scribing companies so check around your hometown.
Most scribe jobs require shiftwork and many are not full time
Thank you for another very helpful response. I very much appreciate it!
D volunteered in a hospital, they put her into the patient records filing department. In retrospect, it is not a good EC for med school application purposes. I think there are two jobs that a student could do with direct patient contact in a hospital situation:
- Information booth receptionist
- Wheel Chair pusher
Since your S will be able to provide longer period of service, he might be able to get a job like those.
D volunteered at a hospital the last few years working with elderly care patients and also newborns.
Thank you @artloversplus and @raclut