Is Shadowing Required?
The short answer: not necessarily.
One of my biggest concerns when applying to American schools was my complete lack of physician shadowing. As most Canadians know, it’s incredibly challenging to find a physician in Canada who will agree to have a ‘premed’ shadow them. This is for a huge number of reasons, including patient privacy and insurance concerns.
Whenever I read American premeds writing about their hundreds of shadowing hours, I felt a sense of panic that my lack of shadowing would negate all of the hard work I did to apply to American schools.
I was elated to hear during an interview that American schools already know about the difference in shadowing culture in Canada – or at least those who regularly admit Canadian students. Not having shadowing hours does not automatically disqualify you as an applicant for many schools.
As it turns out, shadowing wasn’t a big deal after all – I was accepted to my top choice school with a grand total of zero shadowing hours.
Replace Shadowing Hours with Clinical Hours
It’s important to note that even if you don’t need shadowing hours at all schools, clinical hours are still a must. This is even more important if you don’t have any shadowing hours.
The good news is that there are many options to work or volunteer clinically in Canada. I worked in EMS during my undergraduate studies, which introduced me to our healthcare system and acted as a form of ‘shadowing’. Having strong clinical experiences can help demonstrate to admissions that you’ve had exposure to medicine and know what you’re getting yourself into – which is the intent of shadowing to begin with.
Summary
While it’s absolutely a benefit to have shadowing hours as a Canadian applicant to US medical schools, it’s not necessarily required. Pursuing paid or volunteer clinical activities (such as working in EMS) will help demonstrate exposure to medicine while avoiding the challenging task of finding shadowing opportunities in Canada.