UMass Medical School Medical Scientist Training Program

Message From the Director

In July 2018, the UMMS MD/PhD Program received renewal of NIH support for our Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) for another 5 years reflecting the high quality of our training program as only one of two NIH funded MSTP programs in Massachusetts. This training grant continues the support of the exceptional students enrolled in the UMMS MSTP program.

This fall we welcomed nine outstanding students to the MD/PhD Program at UMass. During their time here they will experience the excitement and challenges offered by the academic curriculum, research portfolio, faculty, and mentors who will provide support and advice as they move forward in the program to become outstanding physician-scientists. Our students welcome these challenges and look forward to joining our community of scholars in their pursuit of the dual degree. We enroll students from the best undergraduate universities across the country as a testimony to our world class reputation in basic and translational research, our state-of-the-art facilities, and flexible curriculum which offers limitless academic and research opportunities.

The MD/PhD Program combines the depth of the curriculum of the School of Medicine and the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences along with the rigorous scientific training in nine graduate research programs. The MSTP offers flexibility in the curriculum, specialized MD/PhD courses, and a very supportive mentoring program. In addition to the traditional biomedical sciences research training, our program offers a PhD in Clinical & Population Health Research (CPHR) that addresses the national need to move health research from laboratory to bedside and from patients to health care systems. The CPHR Program offers our students an opportunity to become leaders in clinical and translational research by training them in areas including epidemiology, outcomes research, determinants of disease and health care economics.

The University of Massachusetts Medical School graduated its first medical school class in 1974 and over the past 45 years has established itself as one of the top research medical schools in the country. Craig Mello’s discovery of RNA interference (RNAi) in 1998 and the award of the Nobel Prize in 2006 heralded the outstanding research enterprise created at the Commonwealth’s Medical School. In addition to Craig’s Nobel Prize, UMMS faculty have been the recipients of a Breakthrough Prize, Lasker award, National Academy of Science and Medicine membership (8 Faculty), Howard Hughes Medical Institute Professors (6 faculty), and membership in The Royal Society. In 2018, UMMS faculty received $ 250 M in research support.

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