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The Department of Medicine has experienced tremendous growth over the past several decades, under the leadership of Dr. Samuel Proger, Dr. William Schwartz, Dr. Sheldon Wolff and Dr. Jeffrey Gelfand. In 1998, Dr. Deeb Salem, a nationally recognized cardiologist was named Physician in Chief of Tufts Medical Center and Tufts University School of Medicine.
Professional Staff
140 full time faculty
72 house officers
28 clinical
142 research fellows
Divisions
Cardiology
Endocrinology
Gastroenterology
General Medicine
Geographic Medicine and Infectious Diseases
Hematology and Oncology
Nephrology
Pulmonary
Rheumatology
Unique Programs
· The Division of Clinical Decision Making , the first of its kind in the country, has been a pioneer in the area of clinical decision analysis.
· The Institute for the Improvement of Medical Care and Health was founded in 1988. Members of the Institute have been some of the leaders in the area of outcomes research. The Institute was recently incorporated into our Division of Clinical Care Research .
· Several members of our faculty are based at the United States Department of Agriculture's Nutrition Research Center on Aging, also located on our campus. Some of those faculty are part of our Division of Clinical Nutrition .
Research
The researchers in Tufts Medical Center’s Department of Medicine Divisions and Institutes are pioneers in groundbreaking bench research, clinical trials and developments in health policy. Research is funded by the National Institutes of Health, AHRQ, private foundations, industry, and private individuals. Our three-part mission of providing superb patient care, advancing knowledge, and training the next generation of investigators drives forward with one goal in mind: quickly translating innovative research into pioneering care. Tufts Medical Center and Floating Hospital rank among the top 15 percent of the nation’s independent hospitals to receive federal research funds.
We are home to ground-breaking investigator-initiated Phase I trials for the sickest cancer patients where Tufts Medical Center is the only hospital in Boston offering such cutting-edge therapy. We also engage in multi-site industry-sponsored trials from testing new drug therapies for knee osteoarthritis to evaluating the latest ventricular assist device for patients awaiting heart transplant. Many major pharmaceutical companies conduct research at Tufts Medical Center as we offer a diverse patient population served by physicians determined to provide the best care possible.
Basic research programs in the DOM apply state-of-the-art molecular methods to understanding mechanisms important in human biology and disease. The ultimate goal of our researchers’ work is to translate basic findings into new clinical strategies for diagnosis and therapy. The program is synergistic with our clinical strengths including cardiology, infectious disease, pulmonary, endocrinology, oncology and nephrology. We conduct ground-breaking research in bacterial, HIV, and other viral and parasitic diseases. Our renal program is nationally recognized for their contributions in the fight against chronic kidney disease. Our cardiac researchers investigate ischemic cardiovascular diseases as well as hypertension and congestive heart failure.
The Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI), a collaboration of 43 organizations, founded by Tufts Medical Center and Tufts University, was established with a $20M grant from the National Institutes of Health. The NIH goal is to create a national consortium intended to transform how clinical and translational research is conducted throughout the country. Tufts-CTSI reflects a unique emphasis on community in biomedical research and includes multiple hospitals, health plans, industry leaders, community organizations and universities with the ultimate goal of translating research into better health.
Inpatient Medical Service
The inpatient medical service consists of approximately 120 beds divided into several subspecialty services:
The inpatient services also include a medical intensive care unit team. The usual ward team consists of one resident, one intern, one senior medical student, one junior medical student, and a full time attending physician. The subspecialty system and our small team size are unique. Generally, patients are assigned to the subspecialty service appropriate for their illness. More than half of the patients on most services are admitted on that basis. As a result, house officers are taught about various disease entities by staff physicians who are experts in their specialty. We feel that this greatly enhances both patient care and house staff education. Another unique feature of our program is the full time attending physician who is also the physician of record on all hospitalized patients. This means that the house staff only have to interact with one attending for the management decisions on their patients.
The patient population is extraordinary in its cultural and clinical diversity. Our growing General Medical Associates contribute a large base of primary care for the hospital. Our long standing tradition of excellent subspecialty care has resulted in strong referral bases that continue to supply us with an outstanding spectrum of tertiary and quarternary care medicine. For instance, we have a robust electrophysiology service, are members of consortiums for liver and heart transplantations, perform kidney transplantations and have a growing Bone Marrow Transplantation Service. Our house staff have direct contact with all of these patients.
Ambulatory Services
The ambulatory services of the Department of Medicine include a variety of subspecialty and general internal medicine clinics (the General Medical Associates , the Pratt Diagnostic Clinic and a walk-in clinic). In these settings full time faculty provide supervision of house staff. The Department of Medicine and the hospital have a strong commitment to expand the ambulatory services at our institution.
Emergency Department
The Emergency Department is staffed by house officers from medicine, psychiatry, pediatrics and surgery. Approximately 40 adult medical patients are seen each day; patients seen initially in the Emergency Department account for approximately one third of all admissions to the medical service. We have an excellent group of full time emergency medicine physicians which greatly enhances the teaching program in the emergency department setting. Our attending staff provides 24 hours, 7 days a week coverage.
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