Curriculum
The general principles overriding the residency program are:
- Education comes first
- Residency should be an enjoyable experience
The program is driven by education – not by service needs – for all of its residents (12 traditional Categorical Internal Medicine per year, and four Preliminary Interns). The foundation of the program, which is fully accredited with the ACGME, is its written curriculum, a document that provides the specific educational goals for each of the rotations in Internal Medicine in each year of training.
The strength of our program resides in the spectrum of patients and the diversity of the attending physicians with whom our residents work. The exposure to community-based, voluntary attending physicians in both general medicine and subspecialties complements exposure to the full-time faculty. Unlike the prototypical university urban medical center in which the overwhelming majority of patients are admitted from the immediate surrounding community, the patient population cared for by our residents represents a balanced mixture of patients.
Our programs also offer the house staff the resources of five on-site, fully accredited sub-specialty training programs. These include fellowships in Cardiology, Nephrology, Hematology-Oncology, Pulmonary-Critical Care, and Infectious Diseases, Fellows in these five subspecialty areas interact with residents rotating through their respective consultation services, the Intensive Care Unit, the Coronary Care Unit, and the Oncology service. In addition, fellows actively participate in teaching and supervision of house staff on both an inpatient and outpatient basis, and facilitate house staff participation in research activities within their subspecialty divisions.
During the first two years, residents spend the bulk of their inpatient time rotating through the general medical floor and select subspecialty floor rotations. The first two years are also supplemented with experiences in ICU, CCU, Emergency Department, and certain subspecialties.
A teaching attending physician is assigned to each inpatient team, supervising housestaff in the care of all teaching patients and conducting daily teaching rounds.
On Sunday through Friday nights, a night float team admits patients to the teaching service from 8:00 p.m. to 6:30 a.m. These night admissions are presented at Morning Report and assigned to the floor teams. This system permits us to control the flow of admissions and ensures that the education of the resident remains the priority of the program. Each of the teaching services (including floors and the ICU) has a cap (maximum number of patients that can be managed by the team at any given time) per ACGME guidelines and these caps are enforced strictly. Weekend coverage is provided with a split shift by the floor team members from Saturday morning through Sunday evening, ensuring adherence with ACGME duty-hours regulations.
A sample rotation schedule is provided in the Curriculum section.
Our residency is configured as a 2+6 residency which means that for every six weeks of inpatient rotations the residents spend two weeks on an ambulatory rotation that includes general medicine clinic as well as subspecialty clinics. Ambulatory experiences are integral to the education of our residents and the schedule allows for excellent exposure to subspecialty clinics. These clinics permit rotation through clinics in both medical and non-medical specialties, as well as exposure of off-site private and community-based practices.
The PGY-2’s and PGY-3’s rotate through all specialties of Internal Medicine. The residents thus develop skills through consultation service and specialty outpatient experiences.
We recognize the importance of certain administrative and non-medical education throughout the residency. Formal education in medical ethics, medical economics, utilization management, quality assurance, legal aspects of medicine, and performance improvement is provided throughout the residency.
Nearly all core rotations in our program take place at Newark Beth Israel Medical Center. We are proud of the friendly, intimate atmosphere which we can offer. We also pay careful attending to the human aspects of residency training by providing a favorable call schedule, meals while on-call, and comfortable, convenient sleeping quarters with a modern, well-equipped lounge.
Rotation Overview
Interns
Rotation | Categorical | Preliminary |
Medicine Floors | 12/14 weeks | 12/14 weeks |
ER | 2 weeks | |
Ambulatory | 14 weeks | 14 weeks |
Night Float | 4 weeks | 4 weeks |
Night Medicine | 2 weeks | 2 weeks |
ICU | 8 weeks | 8 weeks |
Elective | 2 weeks | |
Cardiology Consult | 2 weeks | 2 weeks |
Oncology | 2 weeks | 2 weeks |
Neurology | 2 weeks | |
Vacation | 4 weeks | 4 weeks |
PGY-2's
Rotation | |
Medicine floors | 4 weeks |
Ambulatory | 12 weeks |
Night Float | 4 weeks |
ICU | 4/8 weeks |
CCU | 4/6 weeks |
Infectious Diseases | 2/4 weeks |
Endocrinology | 2 weeks |
Hematology-Oncology | 2 weeks |
Geriatrics | 2 weeks |
Elective/Selective | 4 weeks |
ER | 2 weeks |
Vacation | 4 weeks |
PGY-3's
Rotation | |
Elective | 4 weeks |
Medical Floors | 4 weeks |
Medical Officer on Duty |
4/6 week days
4/6 week nights |
ICU | 4/6 weeks |
Rheumatology | 2 weeks |
Ambulatory | 12/14 weeks |
Neurology Consults | 2 weeks |
GI Consults | 2 weeks |
Pulmonary Consults | 2 weeks |
Renal Consults | 2 weeks |
Hematology | 2 weeks |
Cardiology | 2 weeks |
Vacation | 2 weeks |
Schedule Summary
Floors (Blackwell and Osler): During all NBIMC floor rotations residents work “long shifts” every other day depending on their rotation. These shifts are until 8:00 p.m., (if it is your “short shift” day you leave at 4pm), with Night Float relieving floor teams at 8:00 p.m. The Blackwell team consists of a PGY-2 and 2 interns and a Hospitalist. The Osler team consists of a PGY-3 and 2 interns and one Hospitalist that alternates with a Sub-specialty Attending.
ICU: All Critical Care rotations now incorporate a rotating Night Shift schedule, whereby residents spend time on both days and nights. Residents receive sign out at 6:30 a.m. from the night team and sign out to them 6:30 p.m. The day team Interns follow a short and long shift schedule leaving at either 4pm or 6:30pm every other day. The senior either a PGY-2 or PGY-3, depending on the week, works Monday through Friday 6:30 a.m. – 6:30 p.m. and has coverage over the weekend by another resident on either a sub-specialty rotation or on ambulatory to avoid ACGME duty hour violations.
Night Float: The Night Float team consists of one intern and one PGY-2 who work as a team Sunday through Friday nights from 8:00 p.m. till 6:30 a.m. In addition, one intern will be on the Night Medicine Rotation under the direct supervision of an in-house hospitalist. They are relieved after Morning Report at 7:30 a.m. each day. This is also responsible for creating the Morning Report presentation at least 2 days a week.
MOD (Medical Officer on Duty) Call: The weekday MOD responsibilities are divided between a Day-MOD, who works from 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., and a Night-MOD, who works from 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 a.m. Sunday through Friday. Saturday Day & Night MOD responsibilities are covered by PGY-3’s on Subspecialty Services and they work a 24-hour shift from 7:00 a.m. on Saturday to Sunday 7:00 a.m. They are off the rest of that Sunday and return to clinical responsibilities on Monday morning.
CCU (2nd Years ONLY): This is an excellent rotation for exposure to advanced heart failure patients, pre & post cardiac-transplant patients, and those with mechanical circulatory support devices. This rotation begins at 7 a.m. in which you will receive sign out from the Cardiology team overnight (not a Resident team). This rotation is staged by either 2 medicine residents or one medicine resident and one emergency room resident. You will alternate with them to have long and short shifts. Long shift ends at 7 p.m. with sign out and the night team and the short shift person signs out at 4 p.m. This rotation is supervised by the Cardiology Fellow and various Attending Physicians.