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Summer Research Placements

Hey!

I'm a second year medical student looking into doing a summer studentship this year in order to figure out if I want to intercalate. I know there's loads of funding available from various organisations but most of them require that your application is backed up by a researcher and you have a specific project proposal.

I have absolutely no idea how I'd go about finding someone to do a project with. I don't have any particularly good relationships with any of my lecturers/facilitators and I don't have any family contacts. The idea of emailing random researchers seems a bit hit and miss and I also wouldn't even know where to start.

How have other people gone about securing a research placement? Has anyone had good experiences with particular researchers before who they could recommend I approach?

Thankyou!
Original post by Tronick
Hey!

I'm a second year medical student looking into doing a summer studentship this year in order to figure out if I want to intercalate. I know there's loads of funding available from various organisations but most of them require that your application is backed up by a researcher and you have a specific project proposal.

I have absolutely no idea how I'd go about finding someone to do a project with. I don't have any particularly good relationships with any of my lecturers/facilitators and I don't have any family contacts. The idea of emailing random researchers seems a bit hit and miss and I also wouldn't even know where to start.

How have other people gone about securing a research placement? Has anyone had good experiences with particular researchers before who they could recommend I approach?

Thankyou!


Hi,

I did a 6 week Wellcome Trust Biomedical Vacation Scholarship between my 3rd and 4th years (Pharmacy, not Medicine) and received £250/week.

I would recommend starting off by looking through your lecturers' research profile pages on your university website, perhaps reading a few of their recent papers, and then contacting those lecturers whose research interests align with something that you might like to get involved with.

I did exactly that and found something that I'm very interested in (pharmacogenetics of adverse drug reactions) and my supervisor and I are continuing the research as my final year dissertation project. We have enough data to present as a poster at a national conference so far, and the data will also be included in a further publication. I am also working on a literature review of the topic (part of my course), which we're also aiming to publish, so all in all we'll be getting 1 poster presentation at a national conference and 2 full papers - I suspect you may be able to achieve a similar yield if you end up doing a summer project and intercalate. It would also be excellent for your CV generally and should you decide to do a higher research degree later on.

Hope this helps!

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