Junior Clinician (JC) position description

If you are a Columbia medical student interested in volunteering as the junior clinician, please read the following job description and email your contact information to:

For most JCs, this is the first opportunity you will have to actively participate in patient care. Both the Senior Clinician (SC) and the Attending Physician will not only include you in the process of patient care, but ensure that you increase your clinical skills and help you to gain confidence in handling the common patient care situations.

At the beginning of the session, you will be paired up with a SC. For the day you and the SC will work together to care for the patients. The experience will vary depending on the SC, but should include allowing you to begin the interview (chief complaint, history of present illness). At some point during the process, the SC will finish the interview and physical while you observe. If the SC does not explain what they are doing to the patient and you during the physical, please feel free to ask them to do so in a discreet, polite way. In the event that there are unusual or significant physical finds, the SC will ask the patient if you may also exam him/her.

The SC will then present the patient to the attending. If you would like to present a portion, please tell the SC. While the 3rd-year is waiting to present to the attending, you are responsible for ensuring that the patient fills out the demographics questionnaire. You may give the patient the questionnaire and a pencil/pen, ask the interpreter to assist the patient, or assist the patient yourself.

On busy days, or if there are patients waiting, you will conduct intake interviews independent of the SC. The intake interview is a structured process that follows a CoSMO questionnaire. The Session Coordinator will give you the questionnaire.