Clubs and Extracurricular Activities

Pritzker students organize a variety of activities to diversify the experiences of medical students (i.e., to keep us out of the library and remind us all of life outside of the BSLC). Groups are listed in alphabetical order. Take a minute to scan through all of the organizations – you’ll be amazed at the number of opportunities you have! If you don’t see something you’d like to see, start your own group. Also, don’t forget about the wide range of activities sponsored by the University at large (you’ll see flyers advertising these all over campus, or stop by the Student Activities Office, Room 001 on the lower level of the Reynolds Club.)

Community Service:

Adolescent Substance Abuse Program

American Medical Students Association

Association of Latin American Students

Blue Gargoyle Tutoring

Community Health Initiative

The Child Life and Family Education Program

Geriatrics Interest Group

Humanism in Medicine

Ronald McDonald House

Student National Medical Association

Political Action:

American Medical Association

American Medical Students Association

Medical Students For Choice

Medical Students For Life

Physicians for Social Responsibility

Student National Medical Association

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual People in Medicine

Organization of Student Representatives (OSR),

Association of American Medical Colleges

Medical School Republicans

Publications:

The Caduceus

Humanism in Medicine

Synapse

Social Activities:

American Medical Association

American Medical Students Association

Say Ahhh!

Dean’s Council

Education/Discussion Groups:

American Medical Women’s Association

Bioethics Interest Group

Bobs Roberts Pediatric Society

Emergency Medicine Interest Group

Family Medicine Interest Group

Gender Working Group

Gross Issues

Humanism in Medicine

Pritzker Christian Fellowship

Professional/Medical Associations:

Chapters of National Organizations:

American Medical Association

American Medical Students Association

American Medical Women’s Association

Asian Pacific American Medical Student

Association

Association of American Medical Colleges (OSR)

Physicians for Social Responsibility

Local Organizations:

Family Medicine Interest Group

International Medicine Club

Medical Spanish

Association of Latin American Students

Cultural and Religious Focus:

Association of Latin American Students

Asian Pacific American Medical Student

Association

Jewish Medical Student Association

Medical Spanish

Pritzker Christian Fellowship

Student National Medical Association

ALMAS was started in 1997 and has three primary goals. First, we aim to raise awareness of the health care issues facing Chicago’s large Latino community. The second goal is to promote community service activities in the local Latino community. Third, we strive to provide a support group at Pritzker for both students and applicants for admission of Latino descent. Through our active participation in recruiting, we hope to attract more students of Latino descent to our school. If you have any interest in Latino issues and would like to work with us, please let us know.

Contact: Paco Aguilar ([email protected])

ASAP is a community service program in which medical students visit local elementary and middle schools to teach 5th-8th graders about the dangerous effects of substance abuse. Rather than "preaching" to children, the program approaches the material from a scientific, yet personal, perspective. The program usually consists of two to three teaching sessions per school. The ASAP teachers begin with an interactive session during which they introduce the students to normal human organ physiology. The highlight of the program occurs during the second session when real human organs are brought into the classroom. Medical students lead small group discussions during which the normal physiology of the organ, as well as the damage caused by substance abuse, is demonstrated (this is the really fun part.) In the third session, ASAP leaders help kids develop some tools for staying drug-free. This program is a great way to get involved in the local community and have loads of fun.

Contacts: Katie Goodrich ([email protected])

Andrew Booty ([email protected])

The medical student section of the AMA is the largest national organization of medical students with over 33,000 members from 141 accredited U.S. allopathic and osteopathic medical schools across the country. The AMA is the largest lobbying group in the country advocating for doctors and patients. Membership in the AMA gives you a voice to influence health care policy. The AMA medical student chapter at Pritzker provides a wide variety of services and benefits to its members. Programs include JAMA journal clubs and policy discussions.

This year at Pritzker the AMA teamed up with AMSA to sponsor events including a post card drive in support of the Syringe Purchase Act and a panel discussion on the ethics of pharmaceutical gifts to physicians.

For more information, please visit our booth during the orientation week activities fair. You can find out about the benefits associated with joining AMA and sign up!

Contact: Jesse Ehrenfeld ([email protected])

AMSA is a progressive group run by medical students for medical students. On a national level, AMSA is currently active in fighting for legislation to limit residency work hours. On a local level, our chapter has sponsored the following events this year:

This fall AMSA has a lot of cool stuff planned, so join us and get involved!

Contact: Aaron Horne ([email protected])

AMWA at Pritzker is a local chapter of an established national organization. The primary goals of our student chapter are twofold: supporting and advancing the efforts of women in medicine, and promoting discussion and action on health issues, especially those pertaining to women. Ongoing AMWA activities include pairing students with faculty members in the AMWA mentoring program, as well as pot-luck dinners and brown bag lunches with women doctors. Annual AMWA events include a self-defense workshop, a residency panel led by 4th year women who have completed the match process, and a seminar exploring the issues facing women in medicine.

Contacts: Jenny Kreisher ([email protected])

Sarah Bauer ([email protected])

APAMSA is dedicated to spreading awareness about the unique health care needs of the Asian American community, and working towards the abolition of barriers which obstruct the fulfillment of those needs. We do this through education, community service, and creation of a national network of Asian Pacific Americans in health care. Past and future activities include: speaker seminars dealing with issues directly impacting Asian Pacific American health care professionals, regional Asian American health care promotions, a bone marrow drive to increase the pool of minority donors in the national registry, immunization drives and injection training sessions, seminars dealing with the impact of managed care on future doctors, and Asian cuisine socials. We are a young group that is open to new and fresh ideas. All are welcome.

Contact: Suzan Song ([email protected])

BIG was founded in the spring of 1995. Our goals are to foster student discussion and growth regarding the ethical issues that medical students encounter throughout their medical school experience. Unlike the Ethics class offered to first years, we do not see ourselves as a group for teaching the principles and methods of ethics; rather we see our group as offering students a forum to discuss the tough issues and experiences that we face in a nonjudgmental atmosphere. Our issues are student-generated, and the discussions are between the students with facilitation by the ethics fellows. We meet year-round every two to three weeks. The format of discussion varies from case presentations by students about patient care issues that they have faced, to cases brought by the ethics fellows, to discussions about current events, to guest speakers, to watching movies or video clips, to simply talking about what is on our minds at that time. Our group is informal, and we welcome all points of view and all levels of experience.

Contacts: Maya Mehta ([email protected])

Vivien Ho ([email protected])

The Blue Gargoyle Youth Service Center is an outside organization, conveniently located near campus, which is involved in providing volunteer tutors for children from Hyde Park and surrounding areas. Each tutor is matched with a child to work with for the year, and the tutor and tutee arrange times to meet which fit into both of their schedules. The children range in age from early elementary school through high school.

Contact: Call Blue Gargoyle Office at (773) 955-4108

The Bobs Roberts Pediatric Society is an organization unique to Pritzker that is operated and funded by the Department of Pediatrics for the purpose of informing medical students about the field of pediatrics and related areas of child health, development, history, ethics and future career opportunities. It will function through a year-long series of approximately six scheduled meetings open to all medical students. Each session will utilize seminar style discussions led by a faculty member, demonstrations of patients and clinical and/or laboratory facilities, as well as opportunities for socialization with pediatric faculty and house officers. Notices about meetings are usually disseminated via mass email.

Contact: Herbert T. Abelson, M.D., Chairman,

The Caduceus was Pritzker’s student-run newspaper. It sort of died in the last few years, but if you’re interested in journalism and want to get the ball rolling again, this one’s for you. You can find old issues in the student resource room on the third floor of BSLC to see what it was all about.

Contact: Cecilia Sanders ([email protected])

Beyond medical care, the Child Life and Family Education program at The University of Chicago Children’s Hospital helps children and their families deal with the stress and anxiety of being in the hospital. Volunteers are an essential part of the program helping to normalize the environment for the children and brighten their days while in the hospital. Students are required to commit to 4 hours per week for a total of 100 hours of service. Depending on when you can volunteer, there are programs which involve working with children in the large and inviting playroom or being a bedside volunteer. Programs run daily from 9:30-11:45 M-Sa, 2-4:15 M-F and 5:30-7:30 M-TH evenings. Whether you are interested in pediatrics or not, volunteering is a wonderful opportunity to learn about helping children cope with chronic illnesses and lengthy hospital stays. " A Happy Child Heals Faster"

Contact: Karen Peck

([email protected])

CHI’s mission is to address the health care needs of under-served populations. To this end, we strive to provide direct care, education, and referrals to patients as well as to increase awareness of medical needs of the under-served among health professionals. We run two free health clinics in the area: the Maria Shelter Clinic and the Washington Park Children’s Free Clinic. The Maria Shelter houses as many as 50 women and children who temporarily need a safe place to stay. We run the clinic at the shelter once a week. It is staffed by volunteer physicians who give the physical exams and students who take the medical histories. The Washington Park Clinic, entirely founded and created by Pritzker medical students, is a walk-up free clinic for children. It operates every Thursday night and is staffed by volunteer physicians, medial students, and students from the U of C School of Social Service Administration (SSA).

Contact: For Maria Shelter: Olivia Bailey ([email protected])

For Washington Park: Joyce Tang ([email protected])

Chris Rhee ([email protected])

The Dean’s Council meets monthly. It functions as a mechanism by which students can present, through their representatives, matters of concern ranging from medical school activities to hospital policies. Minutes are kept and information is disseminated to all students via e-mail. In addition, the Council handles the appropriation of medical student funds to various student organizations and functions. Any medical student organization or student-run activity desiring funding must apply through the Council. Applications can be obtained from the Director of Student Programs. Elections for the Dean’s Council are held annually by each class.

Contact: Class of 2004 Dean’s Council representatives:

Ijeoma Azodo ([email protected])

Pat Basu ([email protected])

Eric Weil ([email protected])

The EMIG sponsors a series of meetings pertaining to topics in Emergency Medicine, including various residency, sub-internship and practice options. EMIG also covers teaching intubation, suturing, and EKG reading techniques. EMIG has an active mentoring program, where students can come into the ER and observe physicians at work. Also, a series of interactive case study presentations are given by an ER physician as part of a lunch series designed to take medical students through the process of diagnosing and treating interesting cases and diseases. The goals of this group include:

1. Increase exposure of medical students to EM faculty and residents,

2. Facilitating student learning in EM residency and career opportunities,

3. Allow students to explore the intricacies of EM.

Contact: Jonathan Kohler ([email protected])

FMIG focuses on building interest in family practice as a career choice for students here at Pritzker. We are affiliated with the Illinois Academy of Family Physicians. Several meetings are held each quarter that are designed to inform students of the range of possibilities open to family physicians, to help interested students access resources (i.e. family practice externships and clerkships), and to learn how to secure a residency in family medicine. This year FMIG sponsored suturing and injection workshops among other activities.

Contact: Susan Halbach ([email protected])

This newly-founded group is working on a plan to help strengthen Pritzker’s treatment of gender-related issues in medicine. As wonderful as our institution is, it handles these subjects notoriously poorly (there have been studies done on this stuff.) We have lots of work to do, so please join us!

Contact: Julie Chor ([email protected])

The Geriatrics Interest Group (GIG) serves as a resource to Pritzker students who want to learn more about caring for older patients. A quickly growing demographic group, older people will constitute a large proportion of almost every future physician’s patient population. Through GIG, Pritzker students can learn more about the field of geriatrics by attending quarterly lectures on topics ranging from advances in the basic science of aging to geriatric psychiatry, ethics and public policy. GIG officers can also help interested students find appropriate faculty mentors, research positions, and scholarships.

Contact: Kate Thompson ([email protected])

Anatomy was strange. Different people had very different reactions. So we formed a group to talk about what we thought about it all, since most of anatomy consists of other people talking at YOU. Gross Issues sponsored milk & cookie breaks and discussion groups surrounding especially difficult labs, like the hands, pelvis, and face. We also sponsored general discussions about the ethics of dissection and other topics facilitated by Kyle Nash. If you’re interested in sponsoring a group for your class, contact us.

Contacts: Ari Bernstein ([email protected])

Hosts panel discussions on economic and policy issues in medicine, as well as regular discussion and reading groups.

Contact: Nirav Shah ([email protected])

Humanism in Medicine (www.humanism-in-medicine.org) aims to support medical students as they provide respect, compassion and generosity to others within medical settings. The group is sponsored by the Arnold P. Gold Foundation, a national organization committed to fostering humanism in medicine. Future plans of the Pritzker Humanism in Medicine group include:

Contact: Ari Bernstein ([email protected])

IMG is made up of a group of medical students interested in global health issues. Many of us participate in international medical externships during the summer between our first and second years. Fourth year medical students also have the opportunity to experience health care delivery abroad. IMG compiles info about volunteering opportunities, externships and summer programs for people interested in learning about health care delivery in other countries. During the school year, IMG invites guest speakers to discuss global health issues and also does fundraising to help support the students who want to go abroad. The major activity of IMG is an annual trip to Cuba to deliver medical supplies and learn about the Cuban medical system.

Contact: Sue Kim ([email protected])

Contact: Campus Sports Office (773) 702-9557

or visit www.uchicago.edu/students/athletics

JMSA sponsors social events for Jewish medical students, often in conjunction with other programs at the U of C as well as the Graduate Professional Division of the Hillels of Illinois. We also organize educational events, including speakers, debates, and seminars on topics involving Judaism and medicine.

Contact: Anna Meyerson ([email protected])

This vibrant Pritzker organization is an official subgroup of the American Medical Students Association. We provide a supportive environment for gay and bisexual medical students, and we network with the greater Chicago les-bi-gay medical community. In addition, we are committed to organizing educational seminars at Pritzker on les-bi-gay medical issues and sponsoring other educational and social events.

Contact: Suzanne Baumwell ([email protected])

You guessed it - this is the organization is for Republicans.

Contact: Jesse Ehrenfeld ([email protected])

Hola amigos! The Medical Spanish Club at Pritzker wishes you bienvenidos and invites you to join us in our effort. Medical Spanish works to improve our abilities to communicate with patients in Spanish in order to create linguistically and culturally more flexible physicians. Come join us for Spanish-speaking patient interviews in the hospital and other Spanish-oriented activities. All levels are encouraged to participate.

Contact: Freddy Ceballos ([email protected])

Eric Weil ([email protected])

MSFC is a national organization that was founded in response to the shortage of abortion practitioners, the lack of abortion education in medical schools, and the escalating violence against abortion providers. The Pritzker chapter of MSFC was founded during the 97-98 school year and is actively works to increase awareness and educational opportunities for medical students regarding abortion and reproductive health. This year we sponsored mentor programs and physician shadowing at reproductive health clinics. This is a great way to see and learn about things that they don’t teach you in medical school, but should.

Contact: Julie Chor ([email protected])

Jennufer Gnerlich ([email protected])

Rachel Gianfortune ([email protected])

Pritzker really does have it all. This group aims to educate medical professionals on reproductive alternatives to abortion.

Contact: Ali Javaheri ([email protected])

This is our student representation to the American Association of Medical Colleges. OSR gives input on the experience of medical education and serves as a student advocacy group.

Contact: Jesse Ehrenfeld ([email protected])

The PIG people are involved with many different activities for pediatricians-to-be. We invite students to attend pediatric rounds, sponsor a mentor matching program, organize volunteer opportunities to cuddle little ones in the NICU, and host brown bag lunches and discussions with faculty to educate ourselves on pediatric issues ranging from child abuse to pediatric cancer.

Contacts: Venita Chandra ([email protected])

Cathy Humikowski ([email protected])

Brian Kono ([email protected])

PSR aims to reduce violence in society and speaks out against other social and environmental ills. The University of Chicago Chapter has not been active in recent years, but this is an awesome organization looking for a new champion!

Contact: Rosita Ragin in the OME

visit www.psr.org

The purpose of PCF is to provide a network of support, fellowship and accountability during the rigors of our medical school years. Through relationships with fellow Pritzker students as well as Christian doctors and faculty at the University of Chicago, we try to foster an environment where Christian medical students can discuss freely how their beliefs relate to medicine. We would also like to help any student find a home church. It is our hope that PCF can facilitate the personal and spiritual growth that medical school induces and sometimes demands, while at the same time encourage perspective and balance.

Contact: Jimmy Lu ([email protected])

The Ronald McDonald House, established in 1986, is a beautiful facility which provides housing for the families of children undergoing major medical procedures. The goals of our volunteering are two-fold: (1) to provide the families with emotional support while they stay at the Ronald McDonald House, and (2) to provide the volunteers with a unique opportunity to witness the impact illness can have on a family as a whole. This year, we have sponsored many activities and events for families staying at the RMH. We always welcome new volunteers.

Contact: Jen Gnerlich ([email protected])

Do you sing? Say Ahhh is the newly-founded Pritzker A Capella group. We’ve performed at the Freshman Retreat talent show, Liver Rounds, and other hospital events. Practice is once a week and we have tons of fun. (Editor’s note: they sound as good as they look.)

Contacts: Ben Freed ([email protected])

Rekha Vij ([email protected])

Student National Medical Association (SNMA) is an organization interested in the health of communities of minorities. We are affiliated with the National Medical Association (NMA) which is the professional division. Our membership is open to all students with an interest in the affairs of minority communities. SNMA’s main goals are to educate students and physicians about the challenges facing minority communities, the recruitment and continued support of minority medical students, and service projects which can improve the health status of surrounding minority communities.

Contact: Akara Forsythe ([email protected])

Danielle Ware ([email protected])

Synapse is (will be) an art and literary magazine displaying the hidden creative talents of medical students. Sponsored in part by AMSA, we have already started collecting submissions and hope to publish the first edition Fall 2001. We are seeking interested students, with or without experience, to get involved in layout, design, or just to submit creative photography, drawings, paintings, poetry, or prose.

Contact: Cathy Humikowski ([email protected])