The school is a teaching hospital first conceived in 1958. Due to simultaneous expansion initiatives at the hospital, classes did not begin until 1968. Its name was changed to The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in 2012, after a $200 million grant from businessman Carl Icahn.
Post-graduate academics are focused on biomedical sciences and public health. Its campus is located on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, between Fifth and Madison Avenues, stretching from East 98th Street to East 102nd Street.
As of 2024, school is ranked #40 in Best Global Hospitals.[4]
The first official proposal to establish a medical school at Mount Sinai was made to the hospital's trustees in January 1958. The school contemplated a new kind of medical institution encompassing a medical school supported by a teaching hospital. It would include an undergraduate school representing allied health fields, a graduate school of biological sciences, and a graduate school of physical sciences.[5]
Classes at Mount Sinai School of Medicine began in 1968, and the school soon became known as one of the leading medical schools in the U.S., as the hospital gained recognition for its laboratories, advances in patient care and the discovery of diseases.[8] The City University of New York granted Mount Sinai's degrees.[6]
The school expanded programs and added a range of dedicated departments in the subsequent decades. The Edith J. Baerwald Professor of Community Medicine and Social Work (1969); [9] the first Department of Neoplastic Diseases in an American medical school (1973);[10] and the first Department of Geriatrics and Adult Development (1982).[11]
In the 1990s, it created the Cultural Diversity in Medicine Program focused on healthcare availability to diverse patient populations.[12] It was the second institution in the New York Metropolitan area to create an Academic Department of Emergency Medicine (1994),[13] it started the Institute for Gene Therapy and Molecular Medicine (1996),[14] and an Office of Multi-cultural and Community Affairs to add diversity to the demographic composition of the school (1998).[15] In collaboration with the Pew Charitable Trust, the Center for Children's Health and the Environment was formed to examine links between childhood illnesses and toxic pollutants (1999).[16][17]
Mount Sinai's degrees were granted by City University of New York. before 1999, when Mount Sinai changed university affiliations from City University to New York University but without merging its operations with the New York University School of Medicine. This affiliation change took place as part of the merger in 1998 of Mount Sinai and NYU medical centers to create the Mount Sinai–NYU Medical Center and Health System.[18] In 2003, the partnership between the two dissolved.[19][20]
In 2007, Mount Sinai Medical Center's boards of trustees approved the termination of the academic affiliation between Mount Sinai and NYU and it was officially terminated in 2008.[21] In 2010, Mount Sinai was accredited by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education and became an independent degree-granting institution.
On November 14, 2012, it was announced that Mount Sinai School of Medicine would be renamed Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, following a US$200 million gift from New York businessman and philanthropist Carl Icahn.[22][23]
The 18-story Icahn Institute provides 350,000 sf of laboratory, treatment, and education space for the School of Medicine.[24] The campus is located on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, between Fifth and Madison Avenues, stretching from East 98th Street to East 102nd Street.
In 2015, Mount Sinai announced partnerships with The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia as well as National Jewish Health, the nation's leading institutes for pediatric and pulmonary care respectively, leading to the creation of the Mount Sinai Children’s Heart Center[25] and the Mount Sinai – National Jewish Health Respiratory Institute.[26]
The first diagnosed COVID-19 case in New York City was by Mount Sinai emergency department's Dr. Angela Chen.[27]
In March 2020, Elmhurst Hospital Center, the public hospital that serves as a major training site for Mount Sinai students and residents, was the epicenter of New York City's initial COVID-19 surge, with Mount Sinai house staff and faculty serving as the city's first front-line workers treating patients infected with coronavirus.[28] Mount Sinai has since established itself at the forefront of research to understand and treat COVID-19, being named a lead site in a $470 million study to examine the long-term effects of COVID-19.[29]
In April 2019, the Icahn School was named in a lawsuit filed against Mount Sinai Health System and several employees of the Icahn School's Arnhold Institute for Global Health.[30] The suit was filed by eight current and former employees for "age and sex discrimination as well as improper reporting to funding agencies, misallocation of funds, failing to obtain Institutional Review Board approval prior to conducting research in violation of Mount Sinai and federal guidelines, and failing properly to adhere to the guidelines of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act or HIPAA."[31] The school denies the claims. More than 150 students at the Icahn School and more than 400 Icahn and Mount Sinai Health System faculty have signed letters, addressed to the Board of Trustees, calling on the system to investigate these allegations.[32][33]
Mount Sinai's medical curriculum is based on the standard program of medical education in the United States: the first two years of study are confined to the medical sciences, the latter to the study of clinical sciences. The first and second years are strictly pass/fail; the third and fourth years feature clinical rotations at Mount Sinai Hospital (Manhattan) and Elmhurst Hospital Center,[34] a major level 1 trauma center and safety-net hospital known for being situated in the "most ethnically diverse community in the world," serving an area of one million people with recent immigrants encompassing 112 different countries.[35] Other clerkship and residency training sites include the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary, Mount Sinai Hospital of Queens, James J. Peters VA Medical Center in the Bronx, Mount Sinai West, Mount Sinai Morningside, and Mount Sinai Kravis Children's Hospital.
[36]
In the 2023-2024 term, the MD program matriculated 120 students from 8,514 applicants.[39] The median undergraduate GPA of matriculants was reportedly 3.84, and the median Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) score at that time was in 95th percentile, but those admitted through the early-admissions program do not take the MCAT.[citation needed]
The Medical Scientist Training Program is currently[when?] training over 90 MD/PhD students. As one of the most selective medical schools in the U.S., Mount Sinai received 8,276 applications for approximately 140 MD and MD/PhD positions for the 2021–2022 academic year.
Applicants are required to have a bachelor's degree, a competitive MCAT score, and coursework including biology, physics, English and chemistry. A cumulative GPA above is 3.5 is reportedly required.[40] Individual educational programs are accredited through the appropriate bodies, including but not limited to LCME, CEPH, ACCME and ACGME.
College freshmen or sophomores can approach admissions through the FlexMed Program allowing them to apply for early acceptance regardless of prior majors.[41][42]
Master of Public Health (MPH) Program: A two-year program focused on preventing and managing diseases at the population level.
Combined degree programs: Students can earn their MD and another degree through programs such as MD/PhD, MD/MPH, and MD/Master of Science in Clinical Research.
Mount Sinai's four-pronged missions (quality education, patient care, research, and community service) follow the "commitment of serving science," and the majority of students actively participate in some aspect of community service. This participation includes The East Harlem Health Outreach Partnership, which the students of Mount Sinai developed to create a health partnership with the East Harlem community, providing quality health care, regardless of ability to pay, to uninsured residents of East Harlem.[44][45][46][47]
ISMMS was named #46 in global university rankings as determined by U.S. News & World Report for 2022-2023. Rankings by subject for the same period include:[48]
Ranking
Subject
59
Biology and Biochemistry
7
Cardiac and Cardiovascular Systems
8
Cell Biology
24
Clinical Medicine
59
Endocrinology and Metabolism
6
Gastroenterology and Hepatology
17
Immunology
147
Infectious Diseases
29
Microbiology
11
Molecular Biology and Genetics
25
Neuroscience and Behavior
53
Oncology
103
Pharmacology and Toxicology
41
Psychiatry/Psychology
36
Public, Environmental and Occupational Health
18
Radiology, Nuclear Medicine and Medical Imaging
190
Social Sciences and Public Health
46
Surgery
Mount Sinai was ranked 11th overall among research-based medical schools in the 2023 edition of U.S. News & World Report.[49]
The Mount Sinai Hospital, the teaching hospital of ISMMS, was listed in the 2022 edition of U.S. News & World Report Honor Roll, with multiple specialties ranked in the top 20 nationwide (geriatrics #1, cardiology #6, endocrinology #10, neurology & neurosurgery #10, orthopedics #14, rehabilitation #14, gastroenterology #15, urology #16, pulmonology #20).[50] The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai is ranked #14 in ophthalmology.[51]
Mount Sinai was ranked 8th among medical schools in the U.S. receiving NIH grants in 2022,[52] and 2nd in research dollars per principal investigator among U.S. medical schools by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC).[53]
The Annals of Global Health[54] was founded at Mount Sinai in 1934, then known as the Mount Sinai Journal of Medicine. Levy Library Press publishes The Journal of Scientific Innovation in Medicine.[55]
Judith Aberg, infectious disease researcher, George Baehr Professor of Clinical Medicine and Dean of System Operations for Clinical Sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai[86]
David H. Adams, co-creator of the Carpentier-McCarthy-Adams IMR ETlogix Ring and the Carpentier-Edwards Physio II degenerative annuloplasty ring[87]
Joshua B. Bederson, professor and chief of neurosurgery and the first neurosurgeon at Mount Sinai to receive an NIH R01 grant as principal investigator[88]
Deepak L. Bhatt, American interventional cardiologist known for novel clinical trials in cardiovascular prevention, intervention, and heart failure.[89]
Steven J. Burakoff, cancer specialist, author of both Therapeutic Immunology (2001) and Graft-Vs.-Host Disease: Immunology, Pathophysiology, and Treatment (1990), and the director of Mount Sinai Hospital's Cancer Institute[91][92]
Michelle Copeland, D.M.D., M.D., assistant clinical professor of surgery, particularly known for her expertise on ankle liposuction and the treatment of gynecomastia[93]
Valentín Fuster, editor-in-chief of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the only cardiologist to receive all four major research awards from the world's four major cardiovascular organizations, and among the first to demonstrate that acute coronary events arise from small plaques
Andy S. Jagoda, professor and chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine and editor or author of 13 books, including The Good Housekeeping Family First Aid Book (ISBN0-688-17894-4) and the textbook Neurologic Emergencies (ISBN0-07-140292-6)
Mark G. Lebwohl, the Sol and Clara Kest Professor and chairman of the department of dermatology and author of leading book on dermatologic therapy, Treatment of Skin Disease (ISBN0-323-03603-1).
I Michael Leitman, professor of surgery and dean for graduate medical education
Blair Lewis, clinical professor of gastroenterology and instrumental in developing the International Conference of Capsule Endoscopy's consensus statement for clinical application of the capsule endoscopy
Marek Mlodzik, chair of the Department of Molecular, Cell and Developmental Biology, professor of oncological sciences and ophthalmology
David Muller, co-founder of the Mount Sinai Visiting Doctors Program, the largest academic physician home visiting program in the U.S.
Eric J. Nestler, dean for academic and scientific affairs and director of the Friedman Brain Institute at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York
Michael Palese, medical director of the department of urology and among the few surgeons in the U.S. trained in open, laparoscopic and robotic kidney procedures.
Sean P. Pinney, director of both the Advanced Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplant Program and the Pulmonary Hypertension Program
John Puskas, first totally thoracoscopic bilateral pulmonary vein isolation procedure and co-editor of ''State of the Art Surgical Coronary Revascularization the first textbook solely devoted to coronary artery surgery.
Joy S. Reidenberg, Professor of Anatomy, starred in many TV documentaries on PBS, BBC, CBC, SBS, NatGeo, Science Channel, Discovery, Channel 4 (UK), and many other networks, including Inside Nature's Giants, Sex in the Wild, Born in the Wild, Mythical Beasts, Lost Beasts Unearthed, Whale Detective, Humpback Whale: A Detective Story, Brave New World with Stephen Hawking, Big Blue Live, Wild Alaska Live, When Whales Could Walk, Mystery of the Walking Whale, etc.[97]
^Staff (undated). "Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai". Retrieved November 4, 2022. "Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai is ranked No. 11 (tie) in Best Medical Schools: Research and No. 71 (tie) in Best Medical Schools: Primary Care".
^Narla, G; Heath, K. E; Reeves, H. L; Li, D; Giono, L. E; Kimmelman, A. C; Glucksman, M. J; Narla, J; Eng, F. J; Chan, A. M; Ferrari, A. C; Martignetti, J. A; Friedman, S. L (2001). "KLF6, a Candidate Tumor Suppressor Gene Mutated in Prostate Cancer". Science. 294 (5551): 2563–6. Bibcode:2001Sci...294.2563N. doi:10.1126/science.1066326. PMID11752579. S2CID31619019.