Apply for the Scaife Medical Student Fellowship in Substance Use Disorders

Frequently Asked Questions

What Does the Program Consist of?

Students who are accepted into the program participate in an intensive learning experience. Their schedules include:

• Lectures
• A variety of site visits
• Patient contact
• Group sessions with clients
• Training with standardized patients
• Shadowing with residents and physicians
• Opportunities to present what they have learned

When is the Fellowship?

There will be two three-week sessions in 2019, during the following dates:

• Session 1: June 3 – 21, 2019
• Session 2: July 8 – 26, 2019

Who is Eligible to Apply?

Only medical students attending a medical school in the United States will be eligible to participate in this program.

How Many Students will be Accepted?

In order to optimize the clinical experience of the participants, only eight students will be accepted for each session.

What are the Benefits of Participating?

The Scaife Fellowship provides participants with increased knowledge and skills in the following areas:

• Screening for and diagnosing substance use disorders
• Brief motivational interviewing skills
• Adolescent substance use
• Neonatal abstinence syndrome
• Maternal substance use
• Special populations and addiction treatment
• Professional impairment
• Harm reduction strategies
• Residential/inpatient and outpatient treatment modalities
• Family issues in treatment
• Psychiatric co-morbidity
• Medication-Assisted Treatment (MAT)
• Providing referrals to addiction treatment from medical settings

Is There Financial Compensation for Participating?

Participants will receive a $150 per week stipend and a $200 transportation allowance for a total of $650 for the three weeks. Rooms and some meals are also provided.

Questions?

Please contact Jessica Samuel if you have additional questions about the program. E-mail: jessicam@ireta.org.

Want to Learn More?

IRETA has offered the Scaife Medical Student Fellowship for 20 years, and during that time, we have received a great deal of feedback from former students. Below are excerpts from our departing student focus groups:

I couldn’t believe how much I had learned. I came in with a pretty decent baseline of knowledge from what I did in med school, but I’m still so happy with what I got on top of that.

The diverse opportunities to interact with patients really helped open my eyes and enhanced my desire to learn.

I have a better understanding of the addiction treatment system.

Still Want to Learn More?

Take a look at our blog for posts from former students and a summary of our longitudinal evaluation of the program, which was published in the journal Substance Abuse.

Lessons Learned from IRETA’s Scaife Advanced Medical Student Fellowship program (2012)

Utilizing SBIRT in a Student-Run Free Clinic (2013)

The Scarlet Letter A, This Time for Addiction (2014)

It Works! Annual Summer Program Changes Medical Students’ Views of Addiction (2017)