Outreach

Medical Center Honored for Community Service

People who need medical care in Rochester have a new resource, thanks to the voluntary efforts of a group of School of Medicine and Dentistry students who are helping a neighborhood health center run a clinic in the evening one day a week.

The students, who are supervised by family medicine physicians, began seeing patients for free at the St. Joseph’s Neighborhood Center in Rochester’s South Wedge neighborhood last fall. Working in teams of eight, a total of 24 doctors-in-training rotate through the center on Tuesday evenings.

Deepa Camenga, a fourth-year medical student, researched the idea for a year and visited three other student-run clinics in New York while leading the startup with St. Joseph’s.

“There are a lot of young people in medical school who are truly committed to working in this community,” Camenga says. “This has taught me that if you are organized, persistent, and really honest in what you’re trying to do, things will come together.”

While the student-run health center is the first such venture by the School of Medicine and Dentistry, it is the latest in a multidimensional community service effort by the Medical Center, a longstanding commitment that earned national recognition last fall. Rochester received the 2004 Outstanding Community Service Award from the Association of American Medical Colleges, an honor presented annually to a medical college that has developed a comprehensive approach to improving the health of the community in which it resides.

“This award reflects the durability of the commitment to community health that has been made by faculty throughout the Medical Center,” says David Guzick, dean of the School of Medicine and Dentistry. “Community health has become embedded as the fourth mission of the Medical Center across all of its departments. As such, it is not an afterthought, but is interwoven into the fabric of all of our research, patient care, and education activities.”