At UMDNJ, we understand the mutual advantage of being passionately involved in our neighborhoods. Of course, our University is formally dedicated to the pursuit of excellence in service to the community. This key piece of our mission forces us to see the future in the faces and everyday lives of our friends and neighbors. Formal affiliations, partnerships and collaborations extend our reach across the state and around the world; but up close and personally, this passion for putting
ourselves into each community we serve is simply stunning. Students, faculty and staff easily stretch long days of work and study to include volunteer efforts.

No problem. We’ll organize it. We’ll bring others. We’ll be there. Not only are we helping our friends and neighbors but we’re growing ourselves as well.

Jaime Madrigano is a 2005 graduate of the School of Public Health (SPH) whose passion for serving others was kindled by death. “My father died of a stroke when I was young,” she explains. “What also shaped my life was watching a number of loved ones succumb to cancer. I always wanted to make a difference in medicine and realized that I could use my interest in mathematics and statistics to understand disease. The social justice aspect of public health made the field of epidemiology the perfect fit for me.”

Like hundreds of other UMDNJ community activists, this 29-year-old researcher, who completed her master’s this year, needed an outlet for her passion, “to help keep me balanced and to incorporate service more fully into my everyday life and career.” While studying and working full time at Merck in environmental and occupational health, she knew instinctively that it was only active participation in the community that would “keep my spirit alive.”

The organization Madrigano founded, Volunteer Opportunities in Community Engaged Service (VOICES), is dedicated to identifying public health needs and designing projects to meet them. From serving meals in Elijah’s Promise Soup Kitchen in New Brunswick to raising money for Haitian communities, organizing petition drives to urge legislators to tackle the problem of the medically uninsured and running health education workshops in Camden and Edison, VOICES and the students and faculty who volunteer their time are evidence in action of UMDNJ’s passion for community service.

At Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (RWJMS) each year, more than 50 medical residents and students rotate at the Eric B. Chandler Health Center, one of the few federally funded qualified health centers owned and operated by a medical school. Chandler registers nearly 50,000 patient visits annually. The Center offers a full range of ambulatory healthcare options in addition to a number of community based health and wellness programs: Alliance for Teen Health, Shots by Two, a free immunization program for children; Breast Health Community Outreach Program; and Community Outreach Unit, which offers home visits for patients.

Devoting time to clinic work and volunteer options are formally integrated into the RWJMS curriculum but these opportunities also carry weight for intangible reasons. As Heather Grigo, RWJMS class of 2007, tells prospective students who browse the school’s online website, “From day one, plan to get the most out of your experience here by volunteering at a health fair or clinic. Not only will you get to know your classmates but after sitting in lectures all week, it will renew your passion for medicine.”

	Christopher Lawler, DO

Christopher Lawler, DO, School of Osteopathic Medicine (SOM) class of 2004, feels deeply about the role of community service in the practice of medicine. His brainchild, the Camden Saturday Health Clinic (CSHC), just won a national “Caring for Community” award. SOM Dean R. Michael Gallagher, DO, adds, “We were one of only eight medical schools in the country to receive this award from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) in collaboration with the Pfizer Medical Humanities Initiative.” The primary goal of the clinic, open every Saturday from 10 am to 1 pm, is to provide urgent, primary and preventive healthcare as well as health education to the medically underserved population of Camden.

Lawler, at SOM, explains, “To me, studying medicine is a privilege, not a right. As physicians, we make a commitment to those who need our services. I didn’t want to wait until I graduated to start fulfilling that commitment.” Carman Ciervo, DO, chair of the Department of Family Medicine at SOM, has been right there alongside the students at the clinic, some of whom are brand new to medicine. “I’ve witnessed their compassion and dedication,” he says. “This is a great opportunity to give back to the community and to impact the lives of people who wouldn’t otherwise get healthcare.”

When a young woman patient arrives at the building on Broadway in Camden one morning, Jeff Vernon, a first year student, administers a TB test. Under the watchful eye of Andrea Woll, DO, from the SOM Department of Family Medicine, Vernon is clearly jittery about this hands-on medical experience. After all, Vernon admits that interacting with patients just three weeks into medical school is “exciting and a little scary.”

Yet, such student-patient encounters are exactly what Lawler had in mind when he envisioned his free clinic. “It’s a learning experience for students and it helps them understand they are providing an urgently needed service for the people who come here.” Because of the grant money, Lawler’s idea will continue to grow in the Camden city neighborhood, offering additional services, such as preventive health education seminars.

At every level of UMDNJ, in our educational programs, clinical services and training and at the heart of our mission, is this window into community service. Jaime Madrigano and Christopher Lawler are just the tips of a volunteer UMDNJ iceberg of effort. Beneath the surface of our University, throughout the state, as well as nationally and internationally, we are continually seeking to meet the needs of our constituencies and to improve the health and quality of life for everyone in our global village.