Getting a Head Start With AI at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Mar 2, 2026 | Artificial Intelligence, Research, School

Alvira Tyagi is a first-year medical student at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She was part of a research team examining the limitations of ChatGPT Health in a study, which had findings published in Nature Medicine.

Most first-year medical students spend their time mastering anatomy, memorizing biochemical pathways, and adjusting to the pace of clinical training. For Alvira Tyagi, that first year coincided with an opportunity to understand the rapid transformation in how patients seek health information with AI tools.

“In January, OpenAI launched ChatGPT Health, and I was immediately curious as to how people were using it,” she says. ChatGPT Health is a service dedicated to answering health and wellness questions, with options to connect to medical records and wellness apps.

Within weeks of launch, OpenAI reported that more than 40 million people were using ChatGPT Health daily. “In a single day, this tool was engaging far more people than many major hospital systems see annually,” Ms. Tyagi notes. And barely into her first full year of medical training, Ms. Tyagi became involved in a study to examine the reliability of such AI tools for health recommendations, under the mentorship of Ashwin Ramaswamy, MD, an instructor in the Department of Urology.

“We set out to test how well ChatGPT Health handles clinical urgency—specifically, whether it steers users with serious symptoms toward emergency care,” she says.

The research team, comprising several physicians and members from Mount Sinai’s Windreich Department of AI and Human Health (AIHH), conducted a study in which they posed clinical scenarios to ChatGPT Health and gauged how it triaged them, compared to gold-standard decisions from physicians following medical society recommendations.

ChatGPT Health, launched in January 2026, is a service on ChatGPT that lets users ask questions about health and wellness. In addition to asking the chatbot questions, users can also sync wearables to it or even upload lab results and ask it to explain the results.

The team found that textbook emergencies were correctly triaged. However, more than half of true emergencies were under-triaged, and the service’s suicide crisis safety alerts were inconsistent and lacking. The full findings, in an article with Ms. Tyagi as the second author, were published as “ChatGPT Health performance in a structured test of triage recommendations” in Nature Medicine in February.

“I did not expect to be involved in AI-driven health care research so early as a student,” says Ms. Tyagi. “Being part of work that could directly impact patient outcomes has been incredibly meaningful.” Read on to learn how she began working at the intersection of AI and health care, and the importance for students to be familiar with this rapidly evolving field.

How did this research project get started?

It started with me shadowing Dr. Ramaswamy in the Urology Department. In-between surgeries, we talked about our interests in AI in health care, and I learned we had a robust department at Mount Sinai that focused on AI and research.

We continued having conversations about AI in health care, and when OpenAI released ChatGPT Health, the discussions intensified. Immediately, we were texting about the implications of this tool, which coalesced into the idea of a study to examine it.

The project started out with the two of us, but with the help of leadership from AIHH, and other physicians, we managed to find collaborators and were able to begin the study quickly.

What was it like being on the research project as a student?

At first, I was intimidated. I was a first-year student working alongside physicians with far more experience in AI and clinical medicine than I had. It took some time to realize that I didn’t need to match their background to contribute meaningfully. I brought a different perspective. I could think through how someone my age would realistically use a tool like ChatGPT Health—how we’d phrase questions, what we might take at face value, and where misunderstandings could happen. That lens helped us step outside a purely clinical viewpoint.

We knew we needed to move quickly. From its release, ChatGPT Health was already being widely used, and we felt a responsibility to evaluate it while people were actively using it. We completed the data collection within two weeks because we wanted to better understand its safety profile and identify any potential limitations as early as possible. Our goal was not to diminish the value of AI in health care, but to approach it thoughtfully by examining where it performs well and where caution may be warranted.

I have always enjoyed writing, whether for leisure or through my work with my undergraduate newspapers—so it naturally became a larger part of my role in the project. In addition to contributing to data collection, I took on significant responsibility for drafting and editing the manuscript. This involved many late nights and multiple rounds of revisions, but I valued that process. Given that the tool was already being widely used, it was essential that we communicate our findings clearly, accurately, and with appropriate nuance.
I was genuinely excited to be part of the project, especially as a student stepping into the world of AI research for the first time. At the same time, I felt a deep sense of responsibility. I wanted to contribute meaningfully alongside experienced researchers, and I was acutely aware that our findings could influence how people understand and use this technology. That awareness pushed us to be especially rigorous. We carefully crafted our prompts and clinical scenarios to be as comprehensive and realistic as possible.

Was it hard balancing school work and being on this project?

My school work always came first, and I was careful to keep that as my priority. Because of that, much of the research work happened in the evenings. It could be demanding at times, but I truly enjoyed it. Being part of a project that was unfolding in real time, and working alongside people who made the process engaging and collaborative, felt energizing rather than exhausting.

What also made this project so meaningful was that it never felt disconnected from my education. It was a different kind of learning: hands-on, fast-paced, and collaborative. There was constant progress and discussion, and that experience offered something you simply cannot replicate in a classroom.

The structure of the medical education program at the Icahn School of Medicine also helped tremendously. The flexibility and autonomy built into our curriculum made it possible to take on a project like this while staying on track academically. In the end, it was demanding, but it resulted in work I am genuinely proud of.

Should students be thinking about AI more?

As medical students, we’re trained to understand clinical systems and patient care. It can be easy to view AI as something reserved for computer science experts and engineers, and that it’s separate from us and the work we do as clinicians. But that is becoming less and less true by the day.

Patients now have direct access to AI technology, and many will go to doctor appointments having already used them to research symptoms or interpret medical information. At the same time, in our current health care system, patients may wait months to see a physician. In that gap, AI tools can function as a kind of interim resource—offering information, reassurance, or sometimes misinformation—before a patient ever steps into a clinic.

Because of this, it falls on us as future doctors to understand these AI health care technologies before patients come to see us. Understanding and discussing the AI-generated information a patient has already seen may soon become a routine part of taking a patient history. We cannot effectively counsel patients about tools they are using if we do not understand how those tools work, what their limitations are, and where they may fall short.

As part of a generation of physicians training alongside these technologies, we have a responsibility not only to react to AI’s presence in medicine, but to engage with it thoughtfully and proactively.

What advice do you have for students who are interested in AI research?

For students who are not sure whether they can even get started, you absolutely can. You don’t need to be an engineer or have years of technical experience to contribute meaningfully. AI research, especially in health care, needs people who can think critically, ask good questions, and communicate clearly.

Then, for those who aren’t sure how to get started, start having conversations—with classmates, professors, and doctors. A simple conversation in between patient cases is what transformed my shadowing experience at the Urology Department into this research project. There are so many talented scientists and faculty at Mount Sinai, and simply engaging with them by asking questions, sharing your interests, and expressing curiosity, can open doors. Sometimes all it takes is one thoughtful conversation to set something much larger in motion.

Being open to opportunities and willing to learn really makes a difference. I had never done AI research before this project, so stepping into it required me to get comfortable with not knowing everything. But I came to understand that AI is developing so quickly that no one has it completely figured out. Even people with years of experience are still asking questions and adjusting as the field evolves.

That realization made it feel less about being an expert and more about being engaged. You don’t have to start with deep technical knowledge; you just have to be willing to listen, learn, and contribute where you can. In a space that’s changing this fast, humility and curiosity go a long way.

How An Interest in Cardiothoracic Surgery Is Shaping Caroline Tavolacci’s Path as a Surgeon-Scientist at Mount Sinai

Updated on Feb 17, 2026 | Featured, Research, School

Sooyun Caroline Tavolacci, MD, MSCR, with her mentor, Anelechi Anyanwu, MD

Sooyun Caroline Tavolacci, MD, MSCR, is a third-year PhD student in the Clinical Research Program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and a surgeon-scientist in training. Her dissertation research focuses on heart transplantation outcomes, specifically evaluating beating heart transplantation using ex-vivo heart perfusion and its impact on donor pool expansion, under the mentorship of Anelechi Anyanwu, MD, Professor and Vice Chair, Department of Cardiovascular Surgery, and Natalia Egorova, PhD, Professor, Department of Population Health and Science.

In parallel with her doctoral training, Dr. Tavolacci works as a clinical research coordinator in the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery at The Mount Sinai Hospital, Clinical Research Office, which is led by Julie Swain, MD, Professor and Vice Chair of the Department.

Having progressed from an international master’s student to a PhD candidate and hospital employee, she reflects on five years of training marked by perseverance, balance, and growth across research, work, and life.

Her interest in medicine began early, sparked by seeing the Jarvik-7 artificial heart in a school textbook. She was fascinated by the idea of replacing a vital organ, the multidisciplinary care behind it, and the trust required between patients and surgeons.

“What I liked most during my two years of research training at the Icahn School of Medicine was that I could apply what I learned in the classroom right away in real-world settings.” -Sooyun Caroline Tavolacci, MD, MSCR

 

Cardiothoracic surgery has since become her lifelong passion. She completed six years of medical school in South Korea, followed by a cardiovascular surgery sub-internship in Brescia, Italy. After graduating from medical school, and realizing that she lacked experience in clinical research, she sought a program that bridged scientific research and clinical practice, leading her to Mount Sinai’s Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.

“The Icahn School of Medicine is unique as a pioneering model for a medical school grown directly from a hospital, not a university” she says. “The rich clinical environment, combined with strong multidisciplinary faculty, makes it ideal for studying clinical research.”

In 2021, in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, she entered the Master of Science in Clinical Research (MSCR) program at the Icahn School of Medicine while working on an NIH-funded study examining the serological response to the SARS-CoV-2 vaccine in lung cancer patients led by Fred Hirsch, MD, PhD, Professor and Director, Center of Excellence for Thoracic Oncology, The Tisch Cancer Institute. She described this experience as firsthand exposure to bench-to-bedside translational research. Her days began in the lung cancer clinic at the Institute and ended in the Biorepository and Pathology CoRE laboratories.

“Weekly meetings involved thoracic oncologists, thoracic surgeons, pathologists, virologists, immunologists, biostatisticians, and radiologists. This multidisciplinary collaboration and exposure to different perspectives taught me how to approach team science in research,” she says.

Dr. Tavolacci completed her master’s thesis, in which she investigated the mechanisms underlying sex-based differences in immunotherapy response in lung cancer, with Dr. Hirsch and co-mentor Rajwanth Veluswamy, MD, MSCR, a former faculty member of the Icahn School of Medicine and a graduate of the MSCR program. She presented her work at national and international meetings and published her several peer-reviewed articles during her master’s program.

“What I liked most during my two years of research training at the Icahn School of Medicine was that I could apply what I learned in the classroom right away in real-world settings,” she says. “I was extremely satisfied with the coursework and the quality of education I received.”

After completing her MSCR in June 2023, she decided to continue her research education and was accepted into the PhD in Clinical Research program.

“I developed a strong interest in biostatistics during my master’s program,” she says. “My experience was primarily in thoracic oncology, with a focus on lung cancer; however, I wanted dedicated time to learn outcomes research in cardiovascular surgery.”

After her acceptance into the PhD program, she faced significant financial hardship due to a loss in her family and visa restrictions that limited her ability to secure a job at The Mount Sinai Hospital at that time.

She considered returning to South Korea or continuing her academic journey in the United States, but instead reached out for help. In recognition of her academic excellence, she received Emergency Fund support from the Office of Postdoctoral and Student Affairs at the Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences and continued her work-study program through Westchester Medical Center in New York State. During this time, she completed her PhD coursework and conducted heart failure and transplant outcomes research under the mentorship of Suguru Ohira, MD, PhD, Cardiac Surgeon at Hartford HealthCare. This included large database analyses using the United Network for Organ Sharing registry.

Now Dr. Tavolacci balances her dissertation research with her role as a research coordinator in the Department of Cardiovascular Surgery at Mount Sinai. She credits the Icahn School of Medicine’s hospital-based model for naturally generating research questions through close interaction with surgeons, fellows, and residents.

“The clinical exposure I gain every day as a research coordinator helps me understand why these variables scientifically matter in clinical trials and studies, and it directly shapes my academic research,” she says. “With my master’s and PhD training in clinical research, I have a strong understanding of research methodology, such as study design, logistics, objectives and hypotheses, and analysis planning. This foundation is incredibly helpful in performing my role. It is a humbling experience to care for patients and to advocate for advancements in clinical research.”

Dr. Tavolacci frequently mentors prospective international applicants, particularly those navigating funding challenges in the PhD in Clinical Research program. She receives emails and LinkedIn messages from many people interested in clinical research asking how to find a mentor, identify research topics, and secure funding.

“It is challenging, and sometimes being equivalent as an international student is not enough—you have to be better to get noticed. However, people who have been through similar processes recognize your strengths.” She strives to do the same for prospective applicants by sharing her honest journey as an international student.

Dr. Tavolacci recalls what her PhD mentor, Dr. Anyanwu, said during their first meeting: “See how far you have come.” She carries this message with her whenever she faces difficulties or setbacks, using it as a reminder to keep moving forward.

In 2026, Dr. Tavolacci will present her doctoral research at various national meetings within the cardiothoracic surgery community. Throughout her academic journey, she has learned that research comes with many practical challenges. What has been most helpful to her is maintaining concentration and focus to push projects forward and see them through to completion. What she learned the hard way is that everything takes time and effort, and that there are many failures behind every achievement in academia.

Dr. Tavolacci will complete her PhD in two years and plans to enter cardiothoracic surgery residency. Her training will allow her to practice surgery while designing and conducting clinical studies and trials. Her ultimate goal is to become a surgeon-scientist.

Learn more about the Clinical Research Education Program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Mount Sinai AIHH Grand Rounds: A Thoughtful Way to Adopt AI in Health Care

Feb 10, 2026 | Artificial Intelligence, Featured, Research, School

Isaac Kohane, MD, PhD, Chair of the Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, was keynote speaker of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai’s Windreich Department of AI and Human Health (AIHH) December 2025 session of AIHH Grand Rounds.

Health care systems across the country have been increasingly using artificial intelligence (AI) systems to assist and augment what clinicians and researchers can achieve. As adoption of machine learning accelerates, thought leaders have been scrutinizing how AI is being embraced.

“Many doctors are already using these tools, such as OpenEvidence, but without visibility or oversight by health care systems,” says Isaac Kohane, MD, PhD, Chair of the Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School. OpenEvidence is an AI-powered clinical decision support and medical search engine.

Dr. Kohane is a prominent researcher in biomedical informatics and AI whose nearly 400 papers have been cited more than 95,000 times, according to Google Scholar. He was the keynote speaker of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai’s Windreich Department of AI and Human Health (AIHH) December 2025 session of AIHH Grand Rounds. Dr. Kohane wants to see not just more use of AI, but more responsible use—a theme of his lecture, which was titled “A Tipping Point for Clinicians’ Influence Upon AI-Driven Clinical Decisions.”

Dr. Kohane gave a lecture, titled “A Tipping Point for Clinicians’ Influence Upon AI-Driven Clinical Decisions,” which focused on where the opportunities lie for the health care industry to use AI more, but in a thoughtful way that accounted for human values and ethics.
The AIHH Grand Rounds is a monthly seminar series hosted by Mount Sinai’s Windreich Department of AI and Human Health (AIHH). Clinicians and researchers who work extensively with AI, including Girish N. Nadkarni, MD, MPH, CPH, Chair of AIHH (left) and David L. Reich, MD, President of The Mount Sinai Hospital (right), attend to learn and discuss the latest developments in the field.
AI is transforming the health care and scientific publishing industries, with its potential to save time and effort for individuals and institutions. However, as long as there are incentives for perverse behaviors regarding AI, there will be bad actors abusing the technology, says Dr. Kohane. These fields need to collectively reset such cultures and behaviors.
A theme Dr. Kohane discussed in his lecture is the need to build in human values within AI models. There will be occasions when a broad, normative model will fail to account for the needs of an individual patient. He proposes that the responsibility for building human values in AI lies with the clinicians and researchers who use it.
A highlight of the AIHH Grand Rounds is not merely the lectures presented, but the discussions that occur after. These discussions help foster collaboration between researchers as they share ideas.

“I chose these topics for Grand Rounds because I view the Icahn School of Medicine and its leadership as among the most forward-looking in the country,” says Dr. Kohane, “and therefore they should be truly focused on setting an example in terms of accelerating adoption options that are both safe, and also enabling patients and clinicians to benefit from the complementarity of AI to human expertise, as well as changing the promotion process to reflect greater engagement with reproducibility and robust research.”

The AIHH Grand Rounds is a monthly seminar series that showcases developments in how AI, science, and medicine intersect, and features an open discussion to foster collaboration. The inaugural session launched in September 2025.

How should health systems think about engaging with AI as it pertains to patients, clinicians, and researchers in a way that is beneficial to all parties? Dr. Kohane discussed the following themes during the seminar.

Transforming the institution with AI

By their nature, large health care systems in the United States are high-revenue, low-margin businesses, and because of that, they face challenges in moving rapidly with change to avoid disruptions.

Institutionally, AI adoption has found more comfort and scalability on the administrative side of operations, including reimbursement and corporate functions. AI is a critical lever, but not a priority for health care system spending presently, according to Dr. Kohane.

However, the application of AI on the clinical side, including continuity of care, clinical operations, and quality and safety, remains nascent or in pilot stages.

“It’s actually the doctors who are leading [with AI adoption], even when their own institutions are not supporting them directly,” says Dr. Kohane.

That landscape is slowly changing as health care leaders begin to engage their clinicians with AI support where it is needed now, but it should not be at the cost of extended, effortful multi-year governance conversations, Dr. Kohane pointed out. The incentives for using AI in the practice of medicine must be focused on improving care rather than maximizing revenue.

“And so, I anticipate that the future first adoptions will happen in specialized high-end services like concierge services, primary care, or cancer care,” he says. “But eventually, it would become a requisite for the safe practice of medicine, and for meeting the expectation of our patients, that ultimately our health care systems will be propelled into more significant engagement [with AI].”

Transforming publishing and literature review with AI

“Every part of the scientific publication process—that is, the generation of manuscripts and review of manuscripts—is going to be augmented by AI,” says Dr. Kohane. “That is going to present, or is already presenting, challenges that the whole peer-review publishing industry is not well equipped to handle.”

Dr. Kohane discussed a case study in which he created a hypothesis that was incorrect, and with AI tools was ultimately able to generate data that were not only fictional, but designed by AI to avoid detection by the majority of fake-data-generation detectors.

“We’re going to really have to address, first and foremost, the incentives that drive perverse behaviors,” he says. An industry that prizes publication volume, or publishing in high-profile publications over producing work with actual scientific impact—such as important but unglamorous replication studies—is only going to drive bad actors.

In the right hands, AI will increase the efficiency and quality of scholarly scientific review. AI can serve as a prism that allows clinical and laboratory experience to be distilled into new knowledge, forming a substrate for truly lifelong medical education. “However, we have to reset the culture and incentives,” Dr. Kohane says.

Transforming AI with human values

In an industry where urgency and time matters, AI presents a strong value proposition with its capability to process large datasets and execute large volumes of actions in a blink of an eye. Time-consuming tasks can be automated by AI, but when decisions that pertain to the care of individuals with unique needs are left to a normative model that adheres to overarching policies, the individual’s needs might not be met.

The solution is not to turn away from AI, but to develop personal models that account for the needs of not just the patient at hand, but also their caretakers, doctors, or any other relevant stakeholders, says Dr. Kohane. It is about building human values within an AI model, which can flag when an individual case does not align with the normative model.

That work to develop such projects falls on the health care system, says Dr. Kohane. He introduced the Human Values Project, an international initiative led by Harvard Medical School’s Department of Biomedical Informatics, which aims to characterize how AI models respond to ethical dilemmas in medicine, measuring both their default behaviors and their capacity for alignment. And he proposed that researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine have that potential to develop their own human values-based AI models.

“My takeaway from presenting and participating in the AIHH Grand Rounds really stemmed not from the presentation itself, but from discussions I had afterwards with various leaders of the AI efforts,” says Dr. Kohane. “My sense was that more than most institutions, [Mount Sinai’s] leadership was willing to invest and take a chance on pilots of deployments of these technologies to learn fast and adapt fast. And at the same time, everybody recognized that this is very challenging, given our current regulatory environments and incentives.”

Dr. Kohane ended his presentation with a line of wisdom for participants to consider: “There is no one to lead this in the direction we want, other than us.”

Learn more about the Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health and AIHH Grand Rounds

An Early Interest in Immunology Set the Stage for Building a Scientific Career at Mount Sinai

Updated on Feb 8, 2026 | Featured, School

Ananya Parthasarathy, MSBS

Ananya Parthasarathy, MSBS, a first-year student in the PhD in Biomedical Sciences program at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, recalls developing an interest in immunology while growing up in India, including becoming involved in a project to investigate bacterial contents in Indian street foods.

She completed her Master of Science in Biomedical Science at the Icahn School of Medicine in June 2025, and is now continuing to work in the Immunology Multidisciplinary Training Area in the lab of Karen Edelblum, PhD, studying intraepithelial lymphocytes. Before this, she completed her bachelor of science, with honors, in biology at Azim Premji University in Bengaluru, India, where she gained research experience working with bacterial and cnidarian model organisms.

In this Q&A, she discusses why she chose Mount Sinai, the focus of her research in the immune system, and her career aspirations.

Why did you choose to study at Mount Sinai?

I chose to study at Mount Sinai because of the strong research focus of the MSBS program, particularly the wide array of research opportunities in studying immune functioning at barrier sites. Through the MSBS program, I gained not only theoretical knowledge from immunology elective courses, but also invaluable research experience in working with mouse models and using a variety of experimental techniques to study immune functioning in the small intestine.

What were some of your accomplishments during your time in the Master of Science in Biomedical Science (MSBS) program?

During my time in the MSBS program, I had multiple opportunities to present my research to faculty and my peers to receive feedback on my project. In doing so, I received awards such as best presentation at the MSBS Research Symposium in June 2024, and best poster presentation at the Pathology Research Day in May 2025. Outside of Mount Sinai, I attended the American Physiology Society Summit in April 2025, where I was awarded a Research Recognition Award and a Distinguished Abstract Award. Towards the end of my MSBS journey and the start of my PhD, I applied for and received the Society for Mucosal Immunology Technique-Sharing Travel Grant, which will contribute to my PhD project in 2026.

How did the MSBS program prepare you to apply for a PhD program?

The research and academic experience I gained during the MSBS program prepared me for PhD applications. Being part of PhD-level courses delving into fundamental concepts of biomedical science and immunology ensured I had a strong foundation of theoretical knowledge to conduct research. The exposure to multiple research techniques and the resources available at Mount Sinai allowed me to perform independent research and write a thesis for my MSBS degree, which ultimately prepared me for research as a graduate student.

Why continue your education at Mount Sinai with a PhD in Biomedical Sciences?

I enjoyed working in the Edelblum Lab, which is the primary reason I chose to continue my education at Mount Sinai. During the MSBS program, I completed all the academic requirements for the PhD in Biomedical Sciences, which allowed me to jump straight into full time research as a first-year PhD student. Additionally, the multitude of opportunities at Mount Sinai to present one’s research, as well as the accessibility and availability of resources to answer a wide array of research questions, encouraged me to continue my education at Mount Sinai. I also appreciate the collaborative nature of the immunology and graduate student departments at Mount Sinai, and was keen to continue working in such a supportive environment.

What made you interested in the immunology training area?

I have always been interested in understanding how bacteria influence the human body, particularly the immune system. Growing up in India, I was no stranger to conversations about the hygiene hypothesis and the importance of probiotics to the gut microbiome; these conversations made me interested in understanding how microbes in the human body can influence immune functioning at steady state, as well as how this can change in the context of disease. I interned at a microbiology lab in high school to investigate bacterial contents in Indian street foods, and conducted research for my undergraduate thesis on how skincare products affect the human skin microbiome.

What is the focus of your research?

My research in the Edelblum lab explores the role of gd intraepithelial lymphocytes (IEL) in intestinal homeostasis and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). As an MSBS student, I studied the role of CD47 in gd IEL migration, and am finishing up this project to publish soon. For my PhD, I am investigating regulators of gd IEL activation and migration at steady state, focusing on the role of CD103 in signal transduction.

What are your plans after you complete your PhD?

After my PhD, I intend to continue conducting research in immune functioning at barrier sites, whether that be in industry or academia. As a first-year student, I look forward to gaining more experience in academic research, as well as in teaching and mentoring, to better understand the trajectory of my scientific career post graduate school.

Learn more about the PhD in Biomedical Sciences Program

Mount Sinai Nurses: Inspiring the Next Generation Through Unique Learning Opportunities

Updated on Dec 18, 2025 | Featured, Nursing, School

2025 Student Nurse Intern graduates

With a laser focus on cultivating the next generation of nurses, the Mount Sinai Health System leads the way with two unique and popular programs for students. Both provide an invaluable, hands-on, hospital-based experience to those on a path to becoming a nurse. The Summer Student Nurse Internship is available to nursing students who have completed at least one year of nursing school, and the Nursing Pathway Program is open to high school students who may be interested in a nursing career.

Summer Student Nurse Internship

This year, Mount Sinai received 800 applications for its Summer Student Nurse Internship Program. Nearly 150 college students were accepted into the program, representing 40 nursing schools from throughout the United States. Each intern was paired with a registered nurse mentor who they shadowed throughout the 10-week summer program, working nearly full-time hours and on a paid basis.

“Because of the length of the internship, student nurses are able to gain a deeper understanding of how the nurses work, how the unit functions, and what their role will be like as a nurse on the units that goes far beyond what they get from a textbook or clinical rotation,” says Kathleen Schulz, MA, RN, Nurse Education Manager, Nursing Education and Professional Development.

From left: Sophia Cimino, student; David Reich, MD, Chief Clinical Officer of the Mount Sinai Health System; Beth Oliver, DNP, RN, FAAN; and Maria Vezina, EdD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN. Sophia was honored for outstanding performance.

In the summer of 2023, Rhoda Rae Bonglo, RN, BSN, interned at The Mount Sinai Hospital on a postpartum mother-baby unit as a rising senior at the University of Alaska Anchorage. She described her internship experience as a bit of a shock in the beginning.

“Nursing school is much more theory-based, and while we have clinicals, that’s a once-a-week experience, usually following a different RN each time,” she says. “By contrast, the Mount Sinai internship helps you transition as a new grad by bringing the textbook and the classroom to life. I was able to work with the same clinical nurse for three months, three times a week. This gave me some continuity and an invaluable way to learn tips, insights, and how to organize my day as a full-time nurse.”

All aspects of the student nurse internship program are aimed at supporting these future nurses at a critical time in their career path. For example, a series of weekly Enrichment “Lunch and Learn” Sessions provided insights into interviewing, creating resumes, transitioning to practice, exploring advanced practice nursing, and other critical topics. There are also structured reflection opportunities for the interns to meet, hear about one another’s experiences, and build relationships. Mount Sinai continues to expand the practice settings available to the interns, this year adding positions in the OR, hospital-at-home program, behavioral health and ambulatory settings.

Following graduation, Ms. Bonglo applied for a position with the Health System and now works in the Heart Failure Unit at The Mount Sinai Hospital. “I knew without a doubt that’s where I wanted to work,” she says. “I knew the culture, I knew the systems, and I had a few connections with the staff. My internship made for a much smoother start to my nursing career.”

Nursing Pathway Program

Now in its third year, the Nursing Pathway Program is managed by Mount Sinai Nursing in partnership with the Mount Sinai Office for Health Data, Outcomes and Engagement Strategy (HDOES). Developed for local New York City high school students, this six-week summer internship program introduces sophomores, juniors, and seniors in high school to the field of nursing through immersive, hands-on experiences.

“At Mount Sinai, we recognize that the future of nursing begins long before a student enters nursing school,” says Beth Oliver, DNP, RN, FAAN, Chief Nurse Executive, Senior Vice President, Cardiac Services, Mount Sinai Health System. “The Nursing Pathway Program allows us to reach talented, compassionate high school students early—helping them see the incredible opportunities within our profession. By nurturing their curiosity and confidence, we are building a stronger, more diverse nursing workforce to serve our communities for generations to come.”

Graduates from the 2025 High School Pathways Program

This year more than 100 high school students participated in the program, primarily identified through a long-standing collaboration with Grant Associates and NYC Public Schools. Among them were children of Mount Sinai 1199SEIU members, whose placements were made possible through support from Human Resources Labor Relations and an established partnership with the 1199SEIU Child Care Funds & Child Care Corporation—demonstrating a continued commitment to grow from within. Participants were selected based on their grade point average and an application essay. They were then paired with nurse managers and gained exposure by shadowing nurses and patient care associates, observing team meetings and safety huddles, engaging in select non-clinical patient care activities, and more.

“Some of the most gratifying feedback we get comes from parents who share that the experience totally changed their child’s perspective,” says Mackenzy Scott, MBA, RN, CPHQ, Associate Program Director, ​Quality and Safety, Cardiac Services. “They emerge really gung-ho about a career in nursing.”

Popular components of the program include a visit to the Mount Sinai Phillips School of Nursing, where the high school students gain a feel for a critical step in the pursuit of a nursing career. During weekly “Summer Wednesday” presentations, interns from throughout the Health System gather to learn directly from nurses about the various roles and specialties within the profession.

“The Summer Wednesday series was intentionally designed to expand the interns’ understanding of health equity and care delivery by exposing them to presenters from across the Health System, including nursing, medical illustration, data analytics, environmental health, communications, and more,” says Tiffany Keith, MSW, Assistant Director, Mount Sinai Office for Health Data, Outcomes and Engagement Strategy. The sessions typically included morning presentations facilitated by subject matter experts, followed by afternoon panel discussions and interactive intellectual exercises.

“Many of the students mentioned how reassuring it was to hear about the nurses’ varying career journeys,” says Olivia Boos, Pathways Coordinator and Administrative Assistant, Nursing Operations and Cardiac Services.

All involved agree the interns also bring a welcome burst of energy and enthusiasm to their assigned care settings. “It’s important to recognize that it’s not only them learning from us, but we are learning from them,” Mr. Scott says.

To promote this two-way learning, interns are asked to create a summer project—a proposed initiative or idea based on their summer experience—that they present at the program graduation. This year, interns shared their perspectives on artificial intelligence; supply tracking systems; mental health awareness; the importance of preventive care; advancing health equity; and extending mobile health to New York City neighborhoods.

The Mount Sinai Health System administrators of the High School Pathways Program

“It was incredibly fulfilling to watch students discover the many career paths in nursing,” Ms. Keith says. “Not only are they learning about their passions, but they are also drawing parallels between health equity and their own lives and thinking critically about ways to close health care gaps. It was an honor to experience this program through the eyes of the participants.”

“Mount Sinai nurses are leaders,” says Maria L. Vezina, EdD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, Vice President and Chief of Nursing Practice, Education, Advanced Practice Nursing Credentialing, and Labor Relations Partnerships for the Mount Sinai Health System. “They serve as exemplars of what it means to be a strong, skilled, and compassionate nurse. And it’s even more gratifying to see how they inspire young minds to shine.”

Fostering Connections and Collaborations With AI Grand Rounds

Nov 19, 2025 | Artificial Intelligence, Featured, School

The Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health at Mount Sinai hosts a monthly AI Grand Rounds, which serves as a forum for clinicians and researchers to share their findings. The October 2025 session featured Vera Sorin, MD, Cardiothoracic Imaging Fellow at the Mayo Clinic as a speaker.

To foster better awareness and collaboration of AI efforts, the Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health (AIHH) at Mount Sinai established its monthly Grand Rounds—sessions for faculty, trainees, and staff to share ideas, learn about cutting-edge developments, and explore how AI and data science are transforming research and clinical care.

“The Grand Rounds series reflects our ongoing commitment to fostering dialogue, intellectual curiosity, and innovation at the intersection of technology and human health,” said Girish N. Nadkarni, MD, MPH, CPH, Chair of AIHH.

Modeled after medical Grand Rounds—but adapted to the unique focus of AI—the series provides a venue where clinicians, data scientists, and researchers can come together to discuss challenges, share insights, and identify opportunities for synergy.

Each Grand Rounds features invited speakers who are recognized leaders in their fields—both within Mount Sinai and from the broader AI and biomedical research communities. Presentations may cover topics such as machine learning applications in health care, ethical AI, biomedical informatics, and translational data science.

The AI Grand Rounds invites speakers who are recognized leaders in their fields, both from within Mount Sinai and externally. In Dr. Sorin’s presentation, she talked about post-deployment AI monitoring in health care radiology, challenges with foundation models, and innovative ways to overcome them.

The inaugural session kicked off in September, with Anthony Costa, PhD, Director of Digital Biology at Nvidia, as its featured speaker, who presented about accelerating the representation of biology and human health with artificial intelligence. The October session’s featured speaker, Vera Sorin, MD, Cardiothoracic Imaging Fellow at the Mayo Clinic, presented on post-deployment AI monitoring in health care radiology, discussing both technical and performance monitoring approaches at Mayo and addressing challenges with foundation models.

The schedule for 2026 is currently being confirmed, with AIHH leadership planning on balancing internal and external voices for the sessions.

Beyond highlighting excellence in research, organizers hope the AIHH Grand Rounds can inspire new methodologies, help participants explore interdisciplinary research ideas, and build meaningful professional connections, said Dr. Nadkarni.

“These sessions are designed to spark new collaborations, inspire cross-departmental initiatives, and deepen our shared understanding of how artificial intelligence can advance human health,” said Dr. Nadkarni. “Over time, we hope the Grand Rounds will serve not only as a learning platform but also as a catalyst for innovation that drives the Department’s research and clinical missions forward.”

Learn more about the Windreich Department of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health and AI Grand Rounds

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