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Wendy Garrett wants a career in advanced research and teaching, so she enrolled in Yale’s M.D./Ph.D. program, which provides broad exposure to human biology and medicine and in-depth, rigorous training in one of the scholarly disciplines relevant to medicine. All M.D./Ph.D. students receive financial support for tuition, living stipend, and health fees. Funding is provided largely by the Medical Scientist Training Program, a grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences available to U.S. citizens and permanent residents. Additional funding is available through fellowships from the School of Medicine. “With almost seventy-five students, the M.D./Ph.D. program has a significant presence in the school,” says program director James Jamieson, M.D., Ph.D. Students spend an average of 7.5 years completing the requirements for the M.D./Ph.D. program. They usually begin with the first four terms of the medical school curriculum; the summer between the first and second years is spent in lab rotations. Students must request affiliation with a particular department in the Graduate School by the middle of their third year of study. Advanced clinical clerkships and electives are generally incorporated in the first six months of the third year and the last year of the program, after the doctoral dissertation has been completed. Taking six months of clinical clerkships before beginning their research allows M.D./Ph.D. students to participate in outpatient clinical activities during their dissertation work. A new route at Yale for physicians who are interested in research careers is the doctoral degree in Investigative Medicine–the first Ph.D. program anywhere to be administered by a clinical department. Unlike the M.D./ Ph.D. program, the Ph.D. in Investigative Medicine is for physicians who have already earned their medical degrees and completed two years of clinical training. “In this program, the candidates have decided substantially later in their careers to become physician-scientists,” says program director Keith Joiner, M.D., chief of the section of infectious diseases in the Department of Internal Medicine. “The program’s goal is to create an environment that constantly interfaces clinical medicine and investigation of disease.” In addition to the M.D./Ph.D., joint degrees in medicine and law, divinity, business administration, or public health are offered. Each year, a number of medical students construct challenging interdisciplinary programs that take advantage of Yale University’s outstanding array of professional schools. |
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 Wendy Garrett is an M.D./Ph.D. student working with Ira Mellman in his “highly dynamic and interactive” laboratory.  Ira Mellman, left, professor of cell biology and immunology at Yale and founder of Cellular Genomics, Inc., reviews Garrett’s observations along with colleague Graham Warren. |
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Last modified: Wednesday, 11-Aug-2004 15:00:49 EDT. (PL) |