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Clinic Experience

All of the health professions require significant experience in a health professions setting. Medical, dental, and optometry schools want the experience to be sufficient for the student to have a mature understanding of the profession and to be able to reflect upon it. All schools require clinical experience. Some schools have set a minimum of 150-200 hours of clinical experience. Many osteopathic medical schools require experience with an osteopathic physician. Pharmacy, physicians assistant, and physical therapy schools may have more defined minimums for hours of experience and types of settings (and whether those are paid or volunteer). This experience needs to be at least partly after you begin college. These experiences should involve both shadowing and direct patient interaction

Students should keep a record of these experiences and reflect upon them while protecting the privacy of any patients they have observed. Student reflections should not contain any details that would allow a reader to identify a patient. The same respect for patient privacy is true for conversations with fellow students.

 

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