Zero of my MMEs are medical/clinical. Is this an issue?

[Revan47]

Hi all,

At the moment, my 3 most meaningful experiences are:

Research Experience
- 800-1000 hours leading my own imaging project in a BME Lab across 3 years. No pubs, but presented a poster at the highest conference in my field. Benchwork, imaging analysis, specimen dissection, I did it all. I'm proud.

Nonprofit that I founded and run
- 400 hours from Aug 20 to May 21 founding, building, and driving my own nonprofit. We're 501c3 exempt and have raised enough funding to operate for a year. We distribute meals to food pantries across 2 states. By June, we'll hit 1000 meals distributed. Extremely proud. This was really hard but we honestly took a stab at food insecurity during COVID and I couldn't be happier. Might be my most unique experience.

Leadership
- 400 hours across 7 semesters - chair of member development of my fraternity. I led a spiritual discussion group that I am extremely proud of and plays into my PS/why I want to be a physician. It also does a great job of incorporating my Philosophy degree and demonstrates that I'm able to connect with people, I think. I also built and ran an academic support system from the ground up that brought my chapter's GPA from the bottom of IFC to the #2 position by graduation, extremely proud of this.

None of these are clinical. I've been advised by some people online to swap the fraternity experience for ED scribing, which I did for ~150 hours. I mention scribing in my PS, but it honestly wasn't as transformative/longitudinal an activity as my fraternity programs were, and I feel slightly uncomfortable stretching it to an MME. However, I can definitely see the common sense of 'if you want to enter medicine, I would expect that your clinical experience would be one of your most meaningful experiences to you'

@Goro @Faha , what is your wisdom on this? There are few SDN threads on this, which are composed of mostly other students saying not to worry. How would you react if you saw someone with these MMEs, or with no directly medical/clinical MMEs?

Thanks for your thoughts.

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[Faha]

You need clinical experiences where you have actual interaction with patients. 50 hours of physician shadowing, including primary care. The ED scribing hours help but more hours are needed.

 

[Revan47]

You need clinical experiences where you have actual interaction with patients. 50 hours of physician shadowing, including primary care. The ED scribing hours help but more hours are needed.

To be clear, I have plenty of shadowing. It's listed as an activity and is mentioned in the PS. I was asking about designating scribing vs fraternity EC specifically as one of the MMEs.

 

[RespectTheChemistry]

To be clear, I have plenty of shadowing. It's listed as an activity and is mentioned in the PS. I was asking about designating scribing vs fraternity EC specifically as one of the MMEs.

Hmmm...I am not the authority on this (college student), but I would go with the scribing over the fraternity involvement. I think it looks like you aren't as invested in patient care with your most meaningful activities as they are right now.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[LondonVibes]

You need clinical experiences where you have actual interaction with patients. 50 hours of physician shadowing, including primary care. The ED scribing hours help but more hours are needed.

How many hours are needed?

 

[Goro]

Hi all,

At the moment, my 3 most meaningful experiences are:

Research Experience
- 800-1000 hours leading my own imaging project in a BME Lab across 3 years. No pubs, but presented a poster at the highest conference in my field. Benchwork, imaging analysis, specimen dissection, I did it all. I'm proud.

Nonprofit that I founded and run
- 400 hours from Aug 20 to May 21 founding, building, and driving my own nonprofit. We're 501c3 exempt and have raised enough funding to operate for a year. We distribute meals to food pantries across 2 states. By June, we'll hit 1000 meals distributed. Extremely proud. This was really hard but we honestly took a stab at food insecurity during COVID and I couldn't be happier. Might be my most unique experience.

Leadership
- 400 hours across 7 semesters - chair of member development of my fraternity. I led a spiritual discussion group that I am extremely proud of and plays into my PS/why I want to be a physician. It also does a great job of incorporating my Philosophy degree and demonstrates that I'm able to connect with people, I think. I also built and ran an academic support system from the ground up that brought my chapter's GPA from the bottom of IFC to the #2 position by graduation, extremely proud of this.

None of these are clinical. I've been advised by some people online to swap the fraternity experience for ED scribing, which I did for ~150 hours. I mention scribing in my PS, but it honestly wasn't as transformative/longitudinal an activity as my fraternity programs were, and I feel slightly uncomfortable stretching it to an MME. However, I can definitely see the common sense of 'if you want to enter medicine, I would expect that your clinical experience would be one of your most meaningful experiences to you'

@Goro @Faha , what is your wisdom on this? There are few SDN threads on this, which are composed of mostly other students saying not to worry. How would you react if you saw someone with these MMEs, or with no directly medical/clinical MMEs?

Thanks for your thoughts.

Not everything has to be related to Medicine

 

[Revan47]

Not everything has to be related to Medicine

No doubt! I was wondering if swapping the MME to include scribing would help offset an otherwise low number of clinical hours as @K9419 put it. Thanks for the input.

 

[Moko]

At the moment, my 3 most meaningful experiences are:
Research Experience - 800-1000 hours leading my own imaging project in a BME Lab across 3 years.
Nonprofit that I founded and run - 400 hours founding, building, and driving my own nonprofit.
Leadership - 400 hours across 7 semesters - chair of member development of my fraternity.

None of these are clinical. I've been advised by some people online to swap the fraternity experience for ED scribing, which I did for ~150 hours. I mention scribing in my PS, but it honestly wasn't as transformative/longitudinal an activity as my fraternity programs were, and I feel slightly uncomfortable stretching it to an MME. How would you react if you saw someone with these MMEs, or with no directly medical/clinical MMEs?

There is no requirement that ≥1 clinical experience(s) need to be marked as 'most meaningful'. There's something to be said for authenticity.

Rather than asking "why are none of their MME clinical?", we often ask "why does this person even want to be a physician?". Does your application adequately address "why medicine"? And if not, would marking one of your clinical experiences as 'most meaningful' allow you to make a more compelling case with the extra essay?

Your answers to these questions will help guide which activities you should identify as 'most meaningful'. And if someone can't make a compelling case either way, then that's a clear sign that they should not be applying at this time. Just my thoughts.

 

[seanm028]

I think your most meaningful experiences should be those experiences that were, well, most meaningful to you! If you try to shoehorn something into that spot, there's a good chance that the very experienced readers will see through it.

 

[LunaOri]

Do you have a way to relate the learning and personal growth you attained from your MMEs to medicine? Did you develop skills or qualities that will help you as a physician?
It’s definitely true that not every activity has to have a medical focus—we like to see what kind of person you are, and what matters to you.