Want to know how important clinical exposure is to your med school profile? You can have a GPA in the high 3’s and an MCAT score in the high 30’s and still get rejected from a top med school. Throw in some clinical exposure or shadowing with those top marks and you’re practically a shoo-in.
According to most admissions members at top-ranked medical schools, clinical volunteer work is absolutely necessary; an absence of such experience can literally kill an application. Without it you fail to show the adcom that you have investigated the medical field, thereby failing to prove that you know that it’s the right field for you.
Saying that you want to “save lives” or “work in pediatric hematology oncology” is noble and admirable, but do you understand what doctors do on a day-to-day basis to fulfill such a goal? Do you have what it takes to save lives PLUS work 24-hour shifts? Do you like working in a hospital environment? Can you handle dealing with sick people and their families?
Furthermore, if you indicate that you are interested in a particular specialty field, then you MUST be able to discuss what you’ve seen and what you’ve experienced and how those things have contributed to your calling and your desire to enter that specialty field.
An additional tip: If you are the child of a physician, you most likely have more shadowing experience than the average non-child-of-a-physician applicant. However, it is crucial that you acquire clinical experience with doctors who are NOT your parents in fields that are NOT your parents’ fields so that you are certain that your decision to enter a field is because you truly desire that role and those responsibilities and not simply because you are blindly following in the footsteps of your mom or dad.
Remember, if all things are equal—high test scores, high GPA, excellent references, and a solid application—the applicant with the clinical exposure, with the hands-on knowledge that being a doctor is his or her true calling, is the one who will get the fat letter of acceptance.
Related Resources:
• To Research or Not to Research is Thy Pre-Med Question
• 5 Reasons Med Applicants Should Volunteer
• Fatal Flaws to Avoid in Your Med School Essays