I like the above post, Juliette is on point. I would just emphasize the research aspect and say that if it was me, aside from the obvious of needing as high of a GPA and GRE as possible, I would do all I could to gain a ton of research experience with professors. Really bust your keester helping them out, maybe get some good LORs out of that time doing research for them and just push yourself to obtain a lot of experience in research that will look great on your application. If you have time to add anything extra like maybe an internship over the summer doing more practical work like you are talking about at your hospital that would be good, just be wise about timing and don’t take on more than you can realistically handle. I mean it’s important to be able to have a break now and again too, very important. So again if it was me, academic year I would work very hard and structure my classes carefully, try and have balanced semesters so that you aren’t in all super hard classes at once, and make time for you to do a fair amount of research. Get yourself onto some good research studies with good professors and work your way into more and more important roles doing research with them. Spend the summer doing some practical work, but also don’t for get to get some time to relax. I think if you do all that, and if you spend some serious time, like a good 3 months prepping your personal statements for these schools and get them very polished, so they show what you have done and also show your heart, I think you will be a competitive candidate.