IRT Supports Cardinal Free Clinics

On weekends, a group of Stanford undergraduates, physician assistant students, medical students, and physicians take on something few others do: serving as volunteers, they provide completely free health care services to adults who lack insurance.

It's a unified team effort: undergraduate students manage the check-in process and guide patients through their visit; medical trainees conduct the physical exams under the supervision of an attending physician.

Members of the group start their shift by hauling out the equipment and supplies that transform an assortment of rooms and spaces into the two student-run facilities that comprise Cardinal Free Clinics (CFC). Pacific Free Clinic operates on Saturday mornings out of San Jose's Overfelt High School. Arbor Free Clinic is open on Sunday mornings and is located in the Menlo Park VA Hospital. The team needs to complete many tasks before they're ready to see patients, but managing IT equipment is no longer one of them. These days, support technicians from the Office of Information Resources and Technology take on the responsibility for setting up printers and connecting laptops. It’s an arrangement the clinic staff values tremendously, says Annabel Chen, a student manager at the Arbor Clinic.

“We definitely can’t run the clinics without the technology. And honestly, many volunteers, me included, don’t really understand how the systems work. Having the IRT team set everything up for us is so helpful,” said Chen, adding that the technicians often go above and beyond what's expected to tackle tasks such as placing a television in the patient waiting area. She notes that these small acts of kindness fortify the welcoming culture that clinic volunteers strive to nurture.

Jesse Mena began overseeing IT support for the clinics in 2014. Previously, technical help came from students and a contractor. When, simultaneously, the student staff graduated and no replacements stepped forward, and the contractor announced it was time for him to move on, he approached leadership about putting in place a more permanent solution.

As the leader of the five-person IT support team, Mena is charged with creating an organized but flexible schedule that delivers consistent weekend coverage at both locations. Technicians arrive on-site by 7:30 a.m. and typically work until noon. When the clinic hours must be extended due to patient volume, Mena jumps in to provide the extra hours of support.

Emily Pang, a student manager at the Pacific Clinic, said she appreciates Mena’s willingness to be available outside of clinic hours. When clinic volunteers received a grant to purchase scanners, printers, laptops and other equipment, Mena quickly stepped up to set up the new supplies. And when Pang wanted to work on a project to help transition clinic patients to low-cost facilities for ongoing primary care, Mena made sure that she and her colleagues had access to a PHI-protected platform.

“Before IRT started helping, there was a period where we had no IT staff. At one point, the WiFi wasn’t working and we had to scramble to figure out how to take patient notes and document labs without a stable connection. It’s so much easier now – we’ve never had to deal with a situation like that again,” said Pang.

And while Mena's main responsibility is to ensure onsite support for the clinics, he's quick to note that he and his team do much more than plug in wires. "We keep the clinic devices compliant and upgrade the hardware when equipment needs to be replaced. And we create accounts for new students at the beginning of the school year, so they can log into the electronic medical records system," he explains.

Supporting the clinics gives technicians a unique opportunity to see first-hand how their efforts impact patient care, according to John Reuling, IRT’s director of IT Support: “Working alongside providers is a great way for techs to fully understand the breadth of what our team does at Stanford Medicine. They really benefit from the experience of providing in-person technical help to the patient care teams. This, along with other rotation opportunities, is an excellent way for our techs to continue to develop their skills.”

Steve Solano, an IRT desktop support tech who works at the clinics, says he doesn’t mind the weekend hours. He finds it gratifying to provide hands-on support to a “worthy cause that serves the community and also provides valuable educational opportunities to medical students and undergrads.”

“This program basically benefits everyone around it,” he touted.