Why Become a Medical Scribe?

Medical scribing is a unique opportunity for prospective healthcare students to observe and participate directly in patient care. Stanford’s Medical Scribe Fellowship, also known as Clinical Observation and Medical Transcription (COMET), is a one-year post-baccalaureate program designed for highly motivated students interested in pursuing a career in the health professions. Fellows are trained in medical terminology and clinical documentation. They work side-by-side with faculty physicians and other clinicians as experienced medical scribes, seeing patients together at Stanford Healthcare clinics and affiliated clinics in the community.

We are looking for candidates who are academically strong, with excellent interpersonal and leadership skills, who desire an intensive direct patient care experience before applying to medical school, physician assistant school, nursing school, or other graduate school in the healthcare field. Scribing is an unparalleled way to build clinical experience and be immersed in medicine. The COMET Fellowship provides fellows the ability to connect with faculty and develop a mentoring relationship, as well as the opportunity to engage in research or other scholarly pursuits.

One of the goals of the COMET Fellowship is to support our fellows' professional growth. COMET fellows may choose to pursue external part-time employment opportunities or academic classes in addition to their regular COMET scribing duties.  At the end of the fellowship year and based on performance,  fellows are eligible to apply for a one year leadership role as a COMET Chief Scribe overseeing teams of our scribes.

Prospective fellows can apply to be a medical scribe in 17 different specialties: family medicine, internal medicine, senior care, palliative care, endocrinology, cardiology, dermatology, gastroenterology, infectious disease, radiation oncology, express care, gynecology, pelvic health, clinical pharmacy, nephrology, orthopedic surgery, and chronic fatigue syndrome.


Interested in becoming a COMET Fellow?

COMET Alumni: Where are they now?

Here is a short list of our alumni and where they are now after the program.

Alexis Kofoed

Stanford PA School 

Cat Carragee

University of Dublin Medical School

Michelle Tay

UC Davis NP School

Jimmy Yao

Case Western Medical School

Kevin Lee

Drexel PA School 

 

Eugenia Jernick

Rocky Vista Medical School

Andrew Yoon

Duke PA School

Jamie Yang

UCLA Medical School

Laurel Sharpless

Yale MPH School

Sheel Vaniawala

Nova Southeastern DO School

Updated: Nov. 2022

Stanford and Cleveland Clinic Scribe Collaboration

Stanford and Cleveland Clinic have signed a collaboration agreement. Stanford’s medical scribe fellowship is happy to partner with Dr. Sandra Hong of Cleveland Clinic, who has successfully launched their scribe fellowship for the 2019-2020 academic year. We are currently working together to develop a scribe training curriculum.  We’re excited to expand both programs with joint-initiatives and cross-institutional scholarship opportunities. 


Cat Carragee selected as one of first-ever StanDOM COMET Fellows.   More See Tweet

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Burnout among physicians a pervasive problem that can lead to major medical errors  More 

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AI and Stanford Medicine  More 

"Stanford medical school faculty Drs. Matthew Lungren, Nigam Shah, Steve Lin discuss the latest AI research and applications in medicine."  Video features Cathina Nguyen, one of our 2018-19 COMET fellows. Watch here.

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Improving domestic violence screening: A Q&A  More 

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A Unique Scribing Model: The COMET Fellowship for College Graduates  More 

" Like many of her recent college graduate peers, Cat Caragee was unsure how to get from here to there. There was likely a job in the health professions, perhaps as a doctor, but here wasn’t where she needed to be.

Here was working as a scribe in the emergency department at O’Connor Hospital, where the pay was minimum wage and she needed odd jobs to make ends meet. While she was getting some exposure to clinical medicine (“as a scribe you’re there to help the doctors, and any clinical learning is just a sideline,” she says), she also wanted research experience to strengthen an application to medical school. But jobs as a clinical research assistant require years of experience plus work done in the field.

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Program Benefits

  • An unparalleled, immersive clinical experience with outstanding faculty at Stanford University School of Medicine
 
  • Become an experienced medical scribe and an expert in medical terminology and clinical documentation
 
  • Optional research experience
 
  • Opportunity to obtain detailed letters of recommendation from provider mentors
 
  • Increase chances of admission into medical school, physician assistant school, nursing school, or other graduate school in the healthcare field
 
  • Fellowship schedule allows the pursuit of external part-time job opportunities or academic classes in addition to regular COMET scribing duties
 
  • Become eligible to apply for a one-year leadership role as a COMET Chief Scribe
 
  • Opportunity for diversity, equity, and inclusion scholarship for eligible  applicants