Students Introduce Committee for Student Clinical Research

A group of Northeast Ohio Medical University College of Medicine students has teamed up to create the new Committee for Student Clinical Research.

Led by student chairs, the Committee for Student Clinical Research features individual medical specialties, including cardiology, ophthalmology, urology, dermatology, neurosurgery, pulmonology and cardiothoracic and orthopedic surgery.

The student chairs are ready to help their fellow students who are interested in doing research — including those who don’t know where to start.

Each student chair is selected through an application process based on considerable experience in conducting clinical research in that particular field. Due to their experience, these student chairs are also well-connected with individuals – physicians and researchers – who work with medical students during the school year and through NEOMED’s Summer Research Fellowship Program.

“This committee serves as a valuable resource for early-stage students who are looking for opportunities but don’t know the process to get connected. CSCR exists to serve these needs, to foster interest in clinical research among our student body, and to involve senior students as mentors. Above all, it’s invaluable to have someone to whom one can reach out for the small questions that students inevitably will have when first embarking on the research journey,” says Krish Dewan, a rising-fourth year College of Medicine student and CSCR founder.

While the leaders are preparing for the beginning of a new academic year, they’re also working towards rolling out a series of informational podcasts and webinars created by members of the committee’s executive board, including Dewan and Natasha Kesav, a rising fourth-year College of Medicine student who doubles as CSCR’s ophthalmology chair and a National Institutes of Health Research Fellow.

While the specialties are all currently medicine-based, Dewan says all students are welcome to join and the group will add and subtract specialties as interests apply.