JayDoc Community Clinic's student volunteers, staff, and administrators sent Dr. Scott Moser off with a gift and jokes about his receding hairline, but their affection for their longtime adviser is no joke.

"He's a 'yes' person," KU School of Medicine-Wichita student Christina Bourne said. "He never shoots your idea down. He's a giant student advocate."

That's not to say Moser never nixed a student's idea while serving as the clinic's adviser these past 11-plus years, a period during which thousands of medically underserved people received care. But students say one of Moser's biggest contributions was insisting that the student-run clinic live up to that description.

"I don't want to make it sound like he doesn't do a lot because it's a big responsibility," said Letisha Ferris, who like Bourne is a member of the clinic's student executive board. "He's there to offer advice, whether it's financial and getting support for the clinic, or changing policies. He's been very good about being in the background, being there when we need him but not taking over and making it his project."

Bourne, Ferris and others active in the clinic honored Moser at a reception in January. Moser was promoted to associate dean for curriculum last summer, which necessitated stepping away from his JayDoc responsibilities. Dr. Robin Walker has taken over as clinic adviser.

The clinic provides care on Saturdays at Guadalupe Clinic on south Broadway, on Thursday evenings at the JayDoc outreach clinic on north Broadway, and through specialty diabetes and women's clinics.

Moser has been involved since its beginning, when three students approached faculty members about starting a clinic similar to one run by KU students on the Kansas City campus.

Dr. Rick Kellerman, chair of the school's Department of Family and Community Medicine, said the years just after the clinic's start were critical to making sure that initial enthusiasm didn't wane.

"I think the remarkable thing is the continuity of providing the supervision and the oversight," Kellerman said. "Every year you've got a different group of students. Will they be interested, invest themselves, show up? Dr. Moser has supported them in every way."

That includes last year's opening of the outreach clinic, which is geared toward homeless people.

"We've never backed off," Moser said. "We've never started something we couldn't continue. That's something I'm rather pleased with. There remain a lot of opportunities for the future in our collaboration with Guadalupe Clinic, especially as we get more students on this campus."

Walker says Moser left the clinic "in fantastic shape" and says he plans to continue his predecessor's philosophy of "standing back and getting out of the way of these gifted and driven medical students."

"His parting advice to me was that my No. 1 job is to run interference. Keep it a student-run organization and not have outside organizations say 'We need JayDoc to do this.' It's the students who need to decide."

In addition to advising students, Moser has spent many hours volunteering as attending physician at the two JayDoc clinics.

"He's an excellent teacher," Bourne said. "He's such a fun physician to watch. He's so good with patients, teasing out certain information. He has just a calm manner about him. He can quickly get patient trust because of that demeanor."

Moser said he plans to continue occasionally volunteering at the clinic and being "their most ardent cheerleader." He appreciated the gift of a custom-made box for his beloved fly fishing flies -- now prominently displayed in his office -- and the display of photos from earlier in his career when his hair was red ... and more abundant.

"I feel like my job as an adviser was not to squash great ideas from students but to make sure their new ideas were destined to work," he said. "I'm glad they also felt that way."