Volunteer Clinical Faculty (VCF)
The volunteer clinical faculty (VCF) of the Department of Internal Medicine at UC Davis School of Medicine is an integral part of the story of UC Davis and its role in the Sacramento community. VCF has been involved with the school since August 13, 1966, when the Sacramento County Hospital established an affiliation with UC Davis and became the School of Medicine's first clinical teaching site. UC Davis' IM VCF is now in its third generation of service to the university.
Founded in 1966 with a mandate from the California Legislature to train primary care physicians, UC Davis has accomplished this admirably and has consistently been in the top tier of medical schools for primary care training, according to U.S. News and World Report's Best Graduate Schools. However, the UC Davis School of Medicine has also built a solid and growing reputation for research, with over 500 research projects and 23 research centers and programs underway. UC Davis School of Medicine is listed in the top 50 medical schools in the country for research by the same survey. At the same time, the overall reputation for UC Davis is that it has a superb reputation for research, especially in the biological sciences.
One of the strongest ties that the UC Davis School of Medicine has to the Sacramento community is through its volunteer clinical faculty. There are 240 VCF within the UC Davis School of Medicine’s Department of Internal Medicine. Although most are internists or medicine subspecialists, the IM VCF is open to all physicians who wish to contribute their time and talents to the mission of the UC Davis School of Medicine. With a multiplicity of opportunities in all divisions of the Department of Medicine, VCF are at work daily with house staff and students in a variety of settings at UC Davis Health and throughout the community in practice settings with physicians affiliated with Catholic Health Care West, Sutter Health Care, the Veteran Affairs clinics and hospitals and with the Kaiser Permanente Health Care system.
In 2002, Sacramento was named as the most diverse and integrated city in the United States as determined in research for TIME Magazine by the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University. This designation is reflected in the VCF as well as the residents and students at UC Davis Health
There is no better example of the diversity and integration within our program than our participation in community clinics.
- Paul Hom Asian Clinic serving the Asian community
- Clinica Tapati serving the Latino community
- Imani Clinic serving the African American community
- Shifa Clinic serving the Muslim community
- Joan Viteri Memorial Clinic serving a variety of high risk individuals
- Bayanihan Clinic serving the Filipino community
- Willow Clinic serving the homeless community
Each clinic has a unique mission with a remarkable cadre of students caring for patients. The clinics are always looking for interested volunteers to be on site to oversee the students as well as specialty back up by phone or beeper to answer questions while students are seeing patients. There is a 20 hour minimum time commitment per year. For more information about the community clinics, please contact:
Amy Jouan
aljouan@ucdavis.edu
916-734-4106
There are a number of benefits that are available at the university for VCF including the use of university libraries and discounts at campus bookstores and recreation centers.
As to the UC Davis Department of Medicine opportunities for teaching and service to the School of Medicine, these opportunities include:
- Teaching opportunities within most divisions of Internal Medicine at UC Davis Health
- Teaching opportunities within you own community practice setting
- The “TEACH ” program
- Student mentoring
For more information, please contact:
Tim Grennan, M.D.
Kaiser Permanente
916-973-5950
Fax: 916-973-6017
tim.grennan@kp.org