The MD/MPH program allows medical students at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai to pursue a Master of Public Health (MPH) degree while simultaneously working on their medical degree.
The MPH degree is 45 credits with specializations in 8 different areas: General Public Health, Epidemiology, Health Care Management, Environmental Health Sciences, Global Health, Health Promotion & Disease Prevention, Biostatistics, and Outcomes Research. MD students are able to use 12 credits of their medical school curriculum towards the MPH degree.
Four Year Option
Students who choose to complete the dual degree in four years take courses in public health in the evening, after medical school classes have ended.
Five-Year Option
Students in the MD/MPH program also have the option to complete the degree requirements over the course of five years. Generally, students pursuing the dual degree this way take a year off of medical school (known as a scholarly year) to devote the entire year to the MPH degree. You can also pursue the degree by taking a small number of courses during the first two years of medical school and completing the bulk of the degree requirements during the scholarly year.
Students interested in the epidemiology or the biostatistics tracks should speak with an advisor early on and will need to plan carefully and early as scheduling for these classes can be complicated.
For information about how to arrange a scholarly year, please see the scholarly year packet available from the Medical Student Research Office. You can choose when to take your scholarly year, though many choose to begin the MPH year after the third-year medical clerkship.
Admissions
Applicants to the MD/MPH program must complete a supplemental application form obtained from the medical school admissions office or by emailing publichealth@mssm.edu. Upon submitting the form, the Graduate Program in Public Health will collect your submitted AMCAS application for review. Accepted medical students do not need to submit a separate SOPHAS application online.