Welcome to Stony Brook University Medical Center’s Department of Medicine Residency Program. As Program Director, I am thrilled to have the privilege of leading an outstanding group of trainees as they embark into a new era of Internal Medicine. This is a very exciting time for our program: we have a new University President, a new School of Medicine Dean, a new Chair of Medicine, all individuals of the first rank! Stony Brook Hospital is a tertiary care facility which affords our residents a robust clinical experience and enables them to engage in cutting edge scholarly activity. Medical Residency training is the most defining element in the creation of a physician’s ethos. There is a delicate balance between the intensity and duration of immersion in the clinical crucible and the role of reflection, discussion, and intellectual stimulation in the development of an internist. Both are integral and instrumental in molding you into the physician you aspire to become. Our program has been engineered to achieve that balance between the intensely clinical and the analytical and deliberative facets of medical practice in an academic setting.
- Our program is a three-year, ACGME-accredited Medicine Residency program that offers tremendous patient diversity and clinical opportunities. I have assumed the Directorship of the program after nearly six years as Associate Director, and I could not be more energized and passionate about where our training program is headed! Our Heart Center is unrivaled, home to the most advanced diagnostic and interventional approaches to the care of patients with cardiovascular disease where Stony Brook cardiologists treat heart disease in all of its manifestations with the most sophisticated techniques available.
- Our Gastroenterology Division, recognized as a top national program by U.S. News and World Report, provides the only location in Suffolk County where patients with complex gastrointestinal disease can be diagnosed and managed with advanced endoscopic techniques.
- We are proud to boast a leading Cancer Center that brings the most advanced therapies to the patients of Suffolk County afflicted with hematologic and oncologic disease. The Cancer Center is also a place where our trainees spend considerable time learning the ambulatory management of these diseases and come to appreciate the longitudinal care of patients with cancer.
- As a program committed to advancement and constant improvement, we have completed several recent innovations, the most significant of which is a major change in the structure of our clinical schedules - our “4 + 1” system – a system that allows you 4 weeks of an in-depth rotation alternating with one week of ambulatory medicine during which you will have your continuity care clinic experience. This scheduling eliminates conflict between the inpatient and outpatient areas, significantly enhances residents’ quality of life in enabling greater flexibility in responsibilities and more time for personal growth and restoration, and greatly improves the educational and clinical experience in the outpatient area giving our residents a true sense of the beauty and value of Primary Care Internal Medicine.
- We have enjoyed great success in the post-graduate fellowship match with recent graduates going on to advanced training in programs such as Columbia University, Boston University and New York University. Of course, several of our graduates stay right here at Stony Brook University Hospital for world renowned fellowship training in Gastroenterology, Nephrology and Hematology-Oncology, to name only a few.
We strive to provide a clinical education environment best suited to the intellectual development of our residents. To this end, we have limited the patient census on the resident teaching services to ensure that resident-education remains paramount. We have achieved this goal by significantly expanding the size of our Hospitalist program, which has allowed us to keep our resident ward teams below ACGME mandated caps and to increase the time available for the participation of our residents in scholarly endeavors, including outcomes research, clinical trials, investigator-initiated clinical research, educational research, and the like. Our residents are co-authors on projects presented at National and International Society meetings and scholarly publications in peer-reviewed journals. This helps them become integral members of investigational teams, important to establishing valuable relationships with faculty mentors.
With our new chair, Dr. Vincent Yang, and our leadership from Dr. Kenneth Kaushansky as Dean (also an Internist!), we are heading into a bright future. We welcome you to join us, explore all we have to offer, and see for yourself the energy and enthusiasm of the Internal Medicine Residency here at Stony Brook.
Dr. Susan Lane
Vice chair for Education,
Interim Residency Program Director