<p>As you guys know, I read along here in hope of helping my nephew when he applies to med school in the rapidly approaching future!
He has always really liked “old people” and is interested in working with the elderly population. What should he be thinking about?
He has worked as a waiter in a retirement home for a couple of years now, and he volunteers at a hospice. He gets great grades and is a good test taker who takes test prep seriously.</p>
<p>Any ideas of what else he can/should be doing?</p>
<p>He does work with a professor in a lab, but it’s not his favorite thing–he would much rather work with people!</p>
<p>The hospice he volunteers at is associated with a hospital–does that count as hospital volunteering or does he need to do that it addition? He spends his time at the hospice with patients, listening to their stories, reading to them, watching tv with them, going through their photo albums, transporting them around the facility to various programs etc.</p>
<p>By the way–he has also spearheaded a program getting other members of his college fraternity to start volunteering at the hospice, and has made a presentation at their “sister” sorority…so I guess this might count as some sort of leadership?</p>
<p>The program to get others to volunteer–I’d call that leadership.</p>
<p>And as for the lab–not everyone loves research. So long as he has some experience with the scientific process, he ought to be fine.</p>
<p>Re: Volunteering–it’s often recommended that applicants have volunteer experience in variety of different healthcare settings so they get a broader view of medical practice. Although the hospice is associated with the hospital, unless your nephew’s day-to-day activities there actually bring him inside hospital depts. where he has a chance to see physicians and staff interact with patients, I wouldn’t call that hospital volunteering. </p>
<p>He might consider picking up some hours volunteering at other places. Some ideas: the ER dept; walk-in community health clinic; neuro or physical rehab ward; EMT squad… </p>
<p>Does he have an non-medical community service?</p>
<p>I’ll definitely pass this on to him.
He really loves what he is doing. He really feels it when he loses one of his “friends” even though he knows it is what is expected of the hospice experience. He definitely gets lot of interactions with the patients, and their caregivers, but he obviously needs to get in to a hospital itself.</p>