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Thursday, September 30, 2010

Current Projects

Thank you to everyone who was able to attend our first meeting! We hope we can incorporate your ideas as best we can. Below are the projects already up and running.

Pre-Medical Undergraduate Mentoring Program (PUMP)
Website: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/charlesdrewsociety/pump.html
Contact: Kwanza Price, cupump@gmail.com
Signup: Click here

The mission of the Charles Drew Pre-Medical Undergraduate Mentoring Program is to encourage, support, and retain underrepresented minority undergraduates in the pre-med curriculum at Columbia University by providing one-on-one peer mentorship. The program equally seeks to educate and recruit students who may not have considered medicine as a potential career field, or students who know little about what it takes to become a doctor.

HIV Rotation
Website: http://www.centerforcare.org/
Contact: Danielle Beiling, danielle.beiling@gmail.com
Signup: Email Danielle or Erin for application

The Center for Comprehensive Care (St Lukes), Samuels Clinic (Roosevelt) and more recently at the West Village division combined have a patient population of just below 5,000 of New Yorkers affected by HIV. They provide a wealth of health care, mental health, case management services as well as conduct research. The staff at the Saint Luke's clinic have been receptive to postbacc student participation and have helped design this rotation. The purpose of this internship rotation is to examine HIV care in low income communities from a comprehensive public health perspective with an eye towards being future physicians.

The main components include 1) shadowing doctors and assisting in a clinical setting 2) assisting public health research 3) providing assistance in constructing patient education workshops and (possibly) 4) administering satisfaction surveys. The weekly commitment is about 8 hours per week. While the hours are flexible to fit your schedule, once they are set it requires a consistent commitment, regardless of your exam schedule.

Doc to Dock
Website: http://www.doctodock.org/
Contact: Will Spiller, spiller.will@gmail.com
Signup: Click here

Doc to Dock is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that collects unused medical supplies and equipment that would otherwise be sent to landfills or incinerated, and distribute them in developing African nations and Haiti. Will Spiller runs a regular trip to the warehouse in Brooklyn for SJM members on Fridays from 2-5pm, which can be signed up for using the link above.

Physicians for Human Rights (PHR)
Website: http://physiciansforhumanrights.org/
Contact: Jesse Thon, jesse.thon@gmail.com; Lauren Mautner, laurenamautner@gmail.com
Signup: Email Jesse and Lauren

Physicians for Human Rights was founded in 1986 on the idea that health professionals, with their specialized skills, ethical duties, and credible voices, are uniquely positioned to investigate the health consequences of human rights violations and work to stop them. PHR mobilizes health professionals to advance health, dignity, and justice and promotes the right to health for all. The Student Program strives to advance health professional students’ understanding and lifelong investment in health and human rights activism, and to cultivate their unique contributions as advocates promoting health and human rights locally, nationally and globally.

The International Health Organization (IHO)
Website: http://groups.google.com/group/IHO-CUMC
Email: Julia Xu, juliaxuz@gmail.com
Signup: At website or email Julia

The International Health Organization is one of the largest and most active student groups in the CUMC community. We raise the profile of global health issues here on campus as well as send as many students abroad as possible in the first, second and fourth years of medical school. IHO hosts speakers, events and monthly seminars to broaden awareness of world health issues, careers in global health, and international experiences for medical students. A special focus is to convince students that global health embraces all medical specialties - from primary care to neurosurgery.

Forum on Global Health and Human Rights (FGHHR)
Website: http://forumonglobalhealthandhumanrights.blogspot.com/
Contact: Julia Xu, juliaxuz@gmail.com; Jesse Thon, jesse.thon@gmail.com

FGHHR is a student-run collaboration between International Health Organization and Physicians for Human Rights. We organize speaker events centered around a different topic each month pertaining to health care and human rights around the world. The topics are chosen by student coordinators, and experts in the topic are invited to come give a lecture or participate in a panel discussion. We also hold activities, such as documentary screenings, to add further depth to our understanding of the topic.

Our theme for this year's series is the impact of recent economic and political change on the health of populations around the world.

The Micro Equity Development Fund (MEDF)
Website: http://themicroequityfund.com/
Contact: Mark Wien, marklwien@gmail.com
Signup: Email Mark

The Micro Equity Development Fund is a for-profit social enterprise that will provide micro-capital to small and medium businesses in developing countries in the form of equity and generate a return for investors while educating and empowering them with the knowledge to make their own informed investment decisions based on their self-determined personal risk profile.

Micro-entrepreneurs and socially-conscious middle-class investors can begin to fill the so-called “missing middle” in developing economies, resulting in more profitable businesses for the poor and the potential to earn a reasonable return for the investor. Today, equity sources of capital are only available to one-billion people, and only those who can afford the fees of Investment Bankers. There is only one-billion people’s worth of ideas that are being capitalized. We plan to help capitalize the other five-billion people who may have ideas.

Disaster Relief
Website:
Contact:
Signup:

Coming soon!

VIDA Trip to Costa Rica and Panama
Website: http://www.vidavolunteer.org/
Contact: Rachelle Meyer, rdm2110@columbia.edu
Signup: Email Rachelle

VIDA is a non-profit humanitarian association based in Costa Rica operating to provide free medical and veterinary assistance to needy communities by connecting volunteers from around the world with hands-on, eye-opening, mind-enriching experiences in the continuous effort to improve the quality of life for others.

Medical volunteers will work under the supervision of licensed host country physicians taking patient histories with the help of translators as needed. Students will take blood pressures, pulse, respiratory rates, listen to lung sounds, do blood sugar tests, quick strip urine tests, physical exams, pregnancy tests, etc. Volunteers will assist in diagnosing and dispensing medications and prescriptions.

Needle Exchange
Website:
Contact: Erin Broderick, eb2693@columbia.edu
Signup: Email Erin

Coming Soon!

Saving Mothers Research Team
Website: http://www.savingmothers.org/
Contact: Coming Soon!

Saving Mothers is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization dedicated to women's health, education and empowerment. Through training, public health initiatives and research, Saving Mothers aims to provide women and their health care providers with the necessary tools and education to reduce maternal morbidity and mortality.

Friday, July 2, 2010

HIV Rotation Internship at the CCC

Hello SJMers,

I am recruiting for the HIV Rotation Internship at the St Lukes/Roosevelt/St. Vincents HIV clinic(s). If you are not interested, just disregard this email!

The Center for Comprehensive Care (St Lukes), Samuels Clinic (Roosevelt) and more recently at the West Village division combined have a patient population of just below 5,000 of New Yorkers affected by HIV. They provide a wealth of health care, mental health, case management services as well as conduct research. The staff at the Saint Luke's clinic have been receptive to postbacc student participation and have helped design this rotation. To remind you: the purpose of this internship rotation is to examine HIV care in low income communities from a comprehensive public health perspective with an eye towards being future physicians. We are looking for three postbaccs (at least two of whom should be first-years) to join the program, one or two of whom we hope will become future coordinators. As the year goes on, we hope to have your input as to how we can expand and/or deepen our impact on and experience within the CCC and even the HIV positive population of NYC.

Some logistics of the program:
• The main components include 1) shadowing doctors and assisting in a clinical setting 2) assisting public health research 3) providing assistance in constructing patient education workshops and (possibly) 4) administering satisfaction surveys.
• The weekly commitment is about 6 hours per week. While the hours are flexible to fit your schedule, once they are set it requires a consistent commitment, regardless of your exam schedule. We are extremely excited about the educational opportunities the CCC offers.

At this juncture, the CCC is looking for interns who speak Spanish to participate in their current studies. I would like to ask that you respond to this email with your resume and a paragraph about yourself, specifically why you are interested in this opportunity and what kind of experiences you may have had or skills you bring to the table that make you a good candidate. I also would like to remind you that this a two semester commitment, and that there will be other opportunities to get involved if you are a new postbacc and are worried about overextending yourself first semester or you are not a Spanish speaker. That said, this is a great opportunity to start collecting volunteer hours while doing something truly meaningful.

I know this is a holiday weekend so I'll say by Friday the 9th is when I'd like to have these. The sooner the better, of course.

Thanks again for your interest and ethusiasm, and I look forward to hearing from you!

~Danielle

danielle.beiling@gmail.com

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Possible Interesting Postbac Opportunity

Please pass this on to anyone who may be interested.

So as you all know I'm heavily focused/invovled in microfinance and development across the developing world. I spoke at an event a few weeks back and met a doctor who is involved in morbidity/mortality in crisis driven countries. The group, among other things, holds weekly or bimonthly meetings and is going to Haiti in August. If anyone is interested in attending a meeting please let me know which date is best so i can set this up. It would likely involve a discussion on their group and I could provide a background on microfinance and how that is geared at helping to alleviate many of these problems.

Let me know.

Regards,
Mark

marklwien@gmail.com