About CIR

About CIR

50 Years of Advocacy for Resident Physicians

The Committee of Interns and Residents is the largest housestaff union in the country, representing more than 13,000 residents in California, Florida, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico. CIR contracts improve housestaff salaries and working conditions as well as enhance the quality of patient care. CIR was founded in 1957.

In May, 1997, CIR affiliated with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), which now has 2 million members and over 1 million healthcare workers all over the country. Our affiliation with SEIU has increased our strength wherever CIR represents housestaff.

CIR was originally founded by interns and residents in New York City’s public hospitals. In 1958, CIR achieved the first collective bargaining agreement for housestaff anywhere in the U.S. By the mid-1960s, CIR had established the only housestaff-administered benefit plan. By 1969-70, members in the private, or voluntary, sector started organizing and joining CIR.

In a landmark achievement in 1975, CIR won contractual limits for on-call schedules of one night in three. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, CIR successfully negotiated innovative maternity leave clauses, won provisions for pay for housestaff covering for absent colleagues, and in 1989 helped shape New York State’s regulations that set maximum work hour limits for housestaff. Since then, CIR members have negotiated hours limitations and program security clauses in Miami, Los Angeles and Boston. These important advances have become models for improving residency programs across the country.

Transforming What It Means to Be a Resident

What do you want to get out of being a member of CIR? It’s in your hands.

I’m a firm believer that your residency is what you make of it, and this month’s issue of CIR News tells the story of residents who are finding their own balance between work and activism, and transforming their communities, in small and large ways.

» Read more

CIR's History: A Timeline of Presidents

» See the timeline

Links to Related Organizations and Resources

Links to third-party sites on issues and organizations of interest to physicians, general medical resources and legal information on residents' right to organize.

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CIR Executive Committee

May 2009 - May 2010
President
Luella Toni Lewis, MD
Geriatric Medicine

Executive Vice President
Nailah Thompson, DO
Preventive Medicine/
Public Health Fellow
NYC Dept. of Health
New York, NY

Secretary-Treasurer
Elizabeth Burpee, MD
Internal Medicine
Division of Hospital Medicine
VA Medical Center
Albuquerque, NM

Regional Vice President:
Southern California
Michael Jolley, MD
Internal Medicine
Los Angeles County + University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA

Regional Vice President:
Northern California
Davida Flattery, DO
Chief Resident
Internal Medicine
Alameda County Medical Center
Highland Hospital
Oakland, CA

Regional Vice Presidents:
New Mexico
John Ingle, MD
Otolaryngology
University of New Mexico
Health Sciences Center
Albuquerque, NM

Regional Vice President: Florida
Janetta Dominic Cureton, MD
Forensic Psychiatry Fellow
Jackson Memorial Hospital
Miami, Florida

Regional Vice President:
Massachusetts
Michael Mazzini, MD
Cardiovascular Medicine
Boston Medical Center
Boston, MA

Regional Vice President:
New Jersey/DC
Michael Nagar, MD
Pathology
Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital
New Brunswick, NJ

Regional Vice Presidents:
New York
Matthew Harris, MD, MBA
Orthopaedic Surgery
Westchester Medical Center
Valhalla, NY

Anyka J McClain, MD
Emergency Medicine
Lincoln Hospital & Mental Health Center
Bronx, NY

Farbod Raiszadeh, MD, PhD
Internal Medicine
St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center
New York, NY

Vishal Jagmohan Verma, MD
Internal Medicine
Brooklyn Hospital Center
Brooklyn, NY

Vaughn Whittaker, MD

Transplant Fellow
Columbia Presbyterian Hospital
New York, NY