Facts and Figures

The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (ISMMS) is a global leader that boasts an acclaimed faculty and is top-ranked by leading organizations in research funding, innovations, and diversity. At ISMMS we train the physicians and scientists of tomorrow while we conduct breakthrough research and provide multidisciplinary clinical care. This is not an ordinary education; this is an extraordinary life experience.

Quick Facts

Academic Community

584 medical students
95 MD/PhD students
286 PhD students
374 master's degree students
540 Postdoctoral Fellows

Research Funding

$400 million in National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding awarded to our researchers in 2021
14th among U.S. medical schools for NIH funding
Per 2018 AAMC Operations Management Survey, Sinai is in the 99th percentile among US private medical schools in research dollars per investigator.

The School

Since it opened in 1968, the School, has become a world-class leader in medical education, research, and patient care. Dennis S. Charney, MD, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Dean, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and President for Academic Affairs, Mount Sinai Health System, has led the school since 2007.

The School is made up of 39 multidisciplinary research, educational, and clinical Institutes and 35 academic Departments
Annual budget for 2021: $3.2 billion
More than 7,000 full-time, part-time, and voluntary faculty
6,072 people employed full-time by the School (excluding faculty)

Students

For the 2020-2021 academic year:

1,339 students enrolled in MD, PhD, MD/PhD, and master’s degree programs

584 medical students
95 MD/PhD students
286 PhD students
374 master's degree students

More than 2,000 residents and fellows
569 postdoctoral candidates received progressive training
Students graduating with dual degrees

7 dual MD/PhD graduates
3 dual MD/MPH graduates
3 dual MD/MSCR graduates

A diverse pool of students

MD Students:

Women: 50 percent
Underrepresented minorities: 17.8 percent
Age range: 21 to 40

Graduate Students

Women: 62.9 percent
Underrepresented minorities: 22.4 percent
Age range: 20 to 66

Admissions

For the 2020-2011 academic year:

8,916 applications received

6,699 MD (including FlexMed) and MD/PhD applications
2,217 graduate program applications (certificate, master’s and doctoral)

More than 1,100 interviews conducted
- 948 MD and MD/PhD interviews
- 271 graduate interviews
Most popular undergraduate majors for accepted students
- For MD and MD/PhD students : Biology, Biochemistry, Neuroscience
- For graduate students : Biology, Biochemistry/Biological Sciences, Neuroscience, Medicine, Psychology
Average age of entering medical students: 24
Average age of entering grad students: 27
GPA for matriculated MD and MD/PhD candidates
- 3.82 for MD students
- 3.88 for MD/PhD students

Matriculated median UGPA

GPA for matriculated graduate candidates

Matriculated median UGPA: 3.50 for graduate students

Research

ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER BREAKTHROUGH

Our investigators conduct groundbreaking research with funding support that moves discoveries from the bench to the bedside and from the lab to the marketplace.

$413.1 million in National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding awarded to our researchers in 2020

14th among U.S. medical schools for NIH funding

Patient Care

Patients have access to care by physicians with expertise across a wide range of specialties in The Mount Sinai Health System’s network throughout the five boroughs and Long Island.

More than 2,000 physicians saw patients through our Mount Sinai Doctors Faculty Practice, a multi-specialty group practice across approximately 50 practice locations
125 specialties within 29 clinical departments
Approximately 3.5 million annual physician visits to Mount Sinai Doctors Faculty Practice

History of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Innovation

1887

Bernard Sachs, MD, notes the characteristic cellular changes occurring in people with Tay-Sachs disease, a rare inherited disorder that progressively destroys nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord.

1908

The concept of the ‘universal blood donor’ is established by Reuben Ottenberg, MD, who is the first to note that human blood groups are inherited. He is the first to publish mention of using a blood test for compatibility before human blood transfusion.

1910

Nathan E. Brill, MD, discovers Brill’s disease (later known as Brill-Zinsser disease), a type of recurrent typhus. Then, in a 1925 study, Dr. Brill and fellow scientists describe a form of lymphoma now known as Brill-Symmers disease.

1915

Richard Lewisohn, MD, paves the way for modern blood banking after publishing a description of the citrate method of preserving blood, allowing blood to be stored for later transfusion and making indirect transfusion possible and practical.

1932

The first description of what is known today as Crohn’s disease, an inflammatory disease of the intestine, is published by Burrill B. Crohn, MD, Leon Ginzburg, MD, and Gordon D. Oppenheimer, MD.

1959

The field of molecular biology is advanced by Leonard Ornstein, PhD, and Baruch Davis, MD, who develop a technique using polyacrylamide gels to separate biological molecules. Gel electrophoresis and related techniques become the basis for a wide range of biochemical methods, including DNA sequencing.

1963

The New York State Board of Regents grants a charter to The Mount Sinai Hospital to create what becomes the Mount Sinai School of Medicine; a separate but overlapping Board of Trustees for the School is created.

1964

A description of how asbestos can cause cancerous changes in the DNA of cells is demonstrated by Irving Selikoff, MD, Jacob Churg, MD, and E. Cuyler Hammond, MD.

1965

Irving Schwartz, MD, is appointed the first Dean of the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences (formerly known as Mount Sinai Graduate School of Biological Sciences).

1967

The School of Medicine affiliates with The City University of New York.

1967

First Faculty Assembly held; there are approximately 1,200 faculty members of MSSM, including 500 in the Professor, Associate Professor, or Assistant Professor ranks.

1967

Genetics is established as the first PhD training program in the Graduate School. Dr. Hirschhorn receives a grant award to fund the first Genetics program to be a pre- and post-doctoral training program.

1968

First students admitted to MSSM: a first-year class with 36 students with four women and a third-year class with 23 students also starts.

1968

First Mount Sinai School of Medicine class includes 19 graduate students. First PhD degrees are offered in 14 subject areas, including genetics, pharmacology, physiology, and cell biology.

1968

A Health Careers Program for Disadvantaged Youth is begun in the Department of Nursing. It merges with the Department of Community Medicine Student Health Opportunity Program in 1973 to form SETH, which in 1975 becomes the Center for Excellence in Youth Education (CEYE).

1968

The School holds a formal ceremony at the Great Hall at City College; MSSM is dedicated and George James, MD, is inaugurated as the first Dean and President. Four Nobel Laureates included in a daytime colloquium: George W. Beadle, Francis Crick, Sir Peter Medawar, and Linus Pauling.

1970

MSSM graduates first class of 23 students.

1971

First MD/PhD Program students admitted.

1972

First commencement of graduates who had spent all four years at MSSM.

1973

First classes are held in the Annenberg Building; dedicated in 1974 with Vice President Gerald Ford as principal speaker.

1977

Rosalyn Yalow, PhD, receives Nobel Prize for development of radioimmunoassay; work was done at the Bronx VA with Solomon Berson, MD, Mount Sinai Chairman of Medicine, 1968-72.

1977

Rosalyn Yalow, PhD, wins the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the development of radioimmunoassay, a very sensitive in vitro assay technique used to measure substances such as viruses, drugs, or hormone levels in the blood, which made it possible to screen blood donations given by donors. Her work was done in partnership with Solomon Berson, MD, Chair of Medicine, who died before the Nobel Prize was awarded.

1977

The Medical Scientist Training Program (MSTP) officially begins with a T32 grant from NIH. Terry Krulwich is the first MSTP Director.

1979

The Medical School and Department of Medicine develop a leading program in Humanistic Medicine that is to be filmed for use in medical schools throughout the country. Film: “A Complicating Factor.”

1981

Terry Krulwich, PhD, becomes Dean of the Graduate School—the first woman Dean at Mount Sinai. She serves until 2002.

1983

The first use of cholinesterase inhibitors to treat Alzheimer’s disease and improve cognition is developed by a group of scientists led by Kenneth L. Davis, MD.

1987

Humanities and Medicine Program is created to attract liberal arts students to careers in medicine.

1989

MSSM first uses simulated patients to test clinical practice skills of students; later, the Morchand Center opens in 1991.

1991

The gene for Marfan’s disease is discovered by Francesco Ramirez, PhD, and team.

1991

A certificate program in Genetic Counseling begins. In 1996, it becomes a Master’s of Science in Genetic Counseling degree program.

1992

Exendin-4, a peptide that stimulates the release of insulin from beta cells in the pancreas, is discovered by John Eng, MD, and has since helped millions of patients control their diabetes and prevent its complications, such as blindness, kidney failure, and nerve damage.

1993

Infants and children are uniquely sensitive to pesticides and other toxic chemicals in the environment and therefore require special protections in law and regulation, as established in a National Academy of Sciences report by its lead author, Philip Landrigan, MD, MSc.

1993

For the first time, MSSM graduates more women than men, a first in NY State.

1994

Different types of atherosclerosis plaques are classified for the first time by Valentin Fuster, MD, PhD. The classifications are adopted by the American Heart Association (AHA), of which Dr. Fuster is a former Board Member.

1994

Demonstration that antiretroviral treatment can prevent mother-to-child HIV transmission is reported in the international ACTG 076 study, led by Rhoda Sperling, MD.

1995

The Mount Sinai School of Medicine Consortium for Graduate Medical Education (GME) is established.

1996

First Annual Student Research Day.

1996

East Building (today’s Icahn Medical Institute) opens.

1998

First White Coat Ceremony for first-year medical students.

1999

The School changes academic affiliation to New York University.

2001

Institute for Medical Education is established.

2001

Bruce Gelb, MD, claims the first gene discovery for the class of genetic traits now called the RASopathies (Noonan syndrome and related disorders).

2001

Mount Sinai receives one of the first NIGMS grant awards to fund a Postbaccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP) designed to prepare post-baccalaureate graduates from underrepresented groups in biomedical science with the necessary knowledge and skills to pursue PhD degrees in biomedical sciences.

2003

The FDA approves the drug Fabrazyme, developed by Robert Desnick, PhD, MD, David Bishop, PhD, and Yiannis Ioannou, PhD, to treat individuals suffering from Fabry disease, a rare but devastating metabolic condition.

2003

The School organizes the first East Harlem neighborhood walking tour as part of first-year orientation for medical students.

2003

The Master’s program in Community Medicine is converted into a Master of Public Health (MPH) degree.

2004

The Graduate School creates a new degree, the Master of Science in Biomedical Sciences.

2004

The East Harlem Health Outreach Partnership (EHHOP) clinic is created by the students of MSSM. The goal is to provide high-quality primary and preventative health care at no cost to uninsured residents of East Harlem.

2005

Reconstruction of the pathogenicity of the extinct but deadly 1918 pandemic influenza virus is completed by Adolfo García-Sastre, PhD, Chris Basler, PhD, and Peter Palese, PhD, leading to a fuller understanding of other strains, including the 2009 H1N1 virus.

2005

MSSM creates a Center for Global Health to focus on the “needs of underserved populations, both at home and abroad.”

2007

The Graduate School begins offering a new PhD program in Neuroscience in addition to the PhD program in Biomedical Sciences.

2008

INSPIRE program is launched (Individual Scholarly Project and Independent Research Experience), for fourth-year students.

2009

MSSM is named the recipient of the 2009 AAMC Spencer Foreman Award for Outstanding Community Service. According to the AAMC standards, this award “highlights community service as an important element of the academic mission, and singles out institutions that can serve as examples of social responsiveness on the part of the academic medical community.”

2009

The PhD in Clinical Research program enrolls its first students.

2010

The first Mount Sinai School of Medicine Postdoctoral Symposium is held with Harold Varmus as speaker.

2010

The first model of heart disease using human induced pluripotent stem cells is created by Ihor Lemischka, PhD, and Bruce Gelb, MD.

2010

Roger Hajjar, MD, conducts the first clinical trial of SERCA2a gene therapy in humans, showing that this first-of-its-kind gene therapy is safe and effective in patients with advanced heart failure. This trial paves the way for new trials in cardiovascular gene therapy.

2010

The Middle States Commission grants MSSM initial accreditation to be a free-standing accredited body and to grant its own degrees. In conjunction with earlier New York State approval, all MSSM degrees will now just say Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

2012

MSSM rolls out a high-speed computing system called Minerva.

2012

The Hess Building is opened.

2012

The FREEDOM trial, a first-of-its-kind, long-term, worldwide clinical research study at 115 institutions, led by Principal Investigator Valentin Fuster, MD, PhD, finds that individuals who have diabetes and advanced coronary artery disease live longer and are less likely to suffer a non-fatal heart attack when treated with coronary artery bypass graft surgery instead of angioplasty.

2013

The School is renamed Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in honor of Trustee Carl Icahn.

2013

The Mount Sinai Health System is announced, with the Icahn School and seven affiliated hospitals.

2013

The first studies to describe how viruses can be engineered to exclusively replicate in distinct settings, with particular application to vaccine manufacturing and biocontainment respectively, are done by a group of researchers led by Benjamin tenOever, PhD.

2013

The first-ever gene test to identify patients with cirrhosis who are at highest risk of developing the most common type of liver cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma, is developed by Josep Llovet, MD, and Yujin Hoshida, MD, PhD.

2013

The discovery that a novel gene, GNAL, causes adult onset dystonia results from the collaboration between the lab of Laurie Ozelius, PhD, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and a clinical research team led by Susan Bressman, MD, Mount Sinai Beth Israel. This finding points to pathways in the brain’s dopamine system as the origin of pathophysiology.

2014

A new technique for administering ketamine, a drug that can effectively treat depression in a matter of hours, demonstrates that it can be rapidly effective in reversing suicidal thoughts, as found by researchers led by Dennis S. Charney, MD, of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

2014

Icahn School announces new Master of Science program in Health Care Delivery Leadership; the School’s first online course.

2015

Master’s in Biostatistics program begins.

2016

The Postdoctoral Executive Committee at the Icahn School is the recipient of the National Postdoctoral Association 2017 Distinguished Service Award.

2016

A set of 13 genes that can accurately predict whether a transplanted kidney will develop fibrosis is identified by Barbara Murphy, MD, and colleagues. Dr. Murphy’s lab also pinpoints genetic signatures in the blood that can more sensitively identify patients with rejection inflammation of the graft, and several novel mediators of fibrosis in the allograft.

2017

Emma Guttman, MD, PhD, creates an “immune map” of the cells and cytokines involved in the development of atopic dermatitis, work that leads to FDA approval of dupilumab as a breakthrough treatment for the condition.

2017

In a study of early-stage lung adenocarcinoma, researchers led by Miriam Merad, MD, PhD, discover that immune cells start to be dysfunctional very early during tumor formation, suggesting that immunotherapy can be effective much earlier than currently believed.

2017

Mount Sinai spins out its genetic testing laboratories into a new for-profit company, Sema4, aiming to revolutionize clinical diagnostics by combining comprehensive screening and diagnostic testing, predictive modeling, cutting-edge technologies, and open-access data.