Project Summary
The number of physician-scientists in the United States has decreased from its peak of 5% in 1980 to
1.5% today. This decline particularly threatens Pediatrics and child health research where only 12.6% of all
MD/PhD program graduates choose residency training in Pediatrics and in Internal Medicine, while 40% of U.S.
MD/PhD graduates enter Internal Medicine residency programs, these trainees only account for 3.6% of all
Internal Medicine trainees. Together, these data represent a critical need, and opportunity, for new and sustained
efforts to reinvigorate the physician-scientist pipeline infectious diseases, allergy and immunologic diseases. The
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai is well poised to answer this call for novel on-ramps into the Physician-
Scientist Pathway during residency given its established infrastructure for Research Tracks in Residency which
successfully track accomplished researchers to academic research-focused fellowships and are synergistic with
this proposal. The opportunity to cultivate opportunities for research during residency is ideally suited to our
robust translational research programs. Our excellence in biomedical research across the basic, clinical, and
translational spectrum, along with the ability to individualize and adapt to each physician-scientist trainee, makes
our environment an ideal place to train future physician-scientists. The Mount Sinai Stimulating Access to
Research in Residency (StARR) is a new program to enhance physician-scientist research training opportunities
related to the mission of the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI). Mount Sinai StARR will provide
Internal Medicine and Pediatrics residents an entrez into the physician-scientist pipeline, especially focused on
underrepresented minorities and residents with a passion for inquiry but who may not have had extensive
research experience i.e. the “late bloomers”. The program will provide a stepwise introduction to investigative
research to recruit resident trainees and will be an attractive recruiting tool across and outside the Mount Sinai
Health System that will build an immersive individualized research experience with the goal of accelerating and
retaining research independence for resident investigators.