The Medical Cultures Lab (MCL: www.cultureofmedicine.org) seeks a post-doctoral scholar to join our interdisciplinary research group. This position includes team-based research, program coordination, and career and scholarly development.
The incumbent’s principal duties will be with the project “Diverse Cultures, Ethnography, and Decisionmaking in Dementia – Implications for Medical Culture” (DISCERN-MC). Funding for DISCERN-MC is from a Director’s Pioneer award from the National Institutes on Aging (NIA, part of the US National Institutes of Health) to Daniel Dohan, PhD, Principal Investigator. DISCERN-MC uses comparative ethnographic methods to extend our understanding of how social structural position, local institutions, and cultural practices shape experiences and decision-making among older adults living with Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias (ADRD) or experiencing cognitive decline. The project includes field sites in California and the east coast.
The Medical Cultures Lab works to understand the medical culture and advance health equity. Administratively based at the UCSF Institute for Health Policy Studies (IHPS), members hail from multiple units at UCSF (ethics, health and aging, humanities and social sciences, medicine, neurology, social and behavioral sciences, and surgery) and other academic institutions (San Francisco State University, UC Davis, University of Arizona, University of Pennsylvania, and Mass General Brigham). MCL core members include 10 PI’s with active portfolios of independently funded projects. Areas of cross-cutting interest include anti-racism, equity, and inequality; diverse patient, caregiver, and clinician experiences of aging, cognitive decline, and dementia; anti-racist practice in maternal health and burdensome end-of-life care; population-level ethics and neuro-ethics; qualitative research methods. The Lab’s weekly meetings include journal club and didactics, works in progress and professional development, social and grand round gatherings, and equity and advocacy enrichment.
Site: San Francisco Bay Area
Affiliation: Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies - University of California- San Francisco (UCSF).
Duration: One year, with the potential for extension to up to three years.
Effort: 100%; Full-time
Start date: Negotiable; no later than July 1, 2023
Equal Employment Opportunity:The University of California San Francisco is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, protected veteran or disabled status, or genetic information.
Team-Based Research: The incumbent will devote significant effort to conducting community-based ethnographic research as part of the DISCERN-MC team. The incumbent will receive training in the projects’ fieldwork methods and will then independently conduct fieldwork including direct and participant-observation of community activities and in-depth interviews with individuals living with dementia, caregivers, older adults with and without cognitive decline, community members who support older adults, and clinicians and social service providers. Fieldwork will take place 2-3 half-days per week. The DISCERN-MC team meets 1-2 times a week to share reports from the field and develop fieldwork plans and analysis. In addition to their responsibilities in the direct conduct of fieldwork, the incumbent will support data management and analysis of the project’s ethnographic database in coordination with the project PI and co-investigators.
Program Coordination: The incumbent will work Dr. Dohan in his role as MCL PI as well as MCL co-Directors Sarah Garrett, PhD, and Alissa Bernstein Sideman, PhD to coordinate the activities of the Medical Cultures Lab. Primary duties include assembling, collating, and annotating research resources relevant to the qualitative analysis of medical culture and curating and disseminating resources to support MCL members and affiliates. The position also includes limited duties coordinating MCL meetings and events.
Career and Scholarly Development: The incumbent will have protected time to foster their personal career and scholarly development. Some of these activities will occur as part of the incumbent’s wider involvement with MCL, but the incumbent will also have the opportunity to engage other faculty and units.
Applicants with a PhD in any field that involved qualitative social science research (anthropology, political science, sociology; public health, public policy, social welfare) are encouraged to apply. PhD must be conferred by the date of hire. Applicants must have experience with qualitative analysis methods. Applicants with ethnographic research experience and with research or lived experience in minoritized communities will be prioritized.
Interested applicants can send a cover letter and CV to Daniel Dohan ([email protected]). Applications received by March 24, 2023, will receive full consideration. Applications received after that date may be considered until the position is filled.