Biomedical Sciences (PhD) - MD/PhD Track

The College of Medicine offers an integrated MD/PhD curriculum that enables students to fulfill all requirements and earn the Doctor of Medicine and the Doctor of Philosophy.

This program provides opportunity for MD students to obtain advanced research and training experience and for PhD students to obtain medical training. The program develops physician-scientists with preparation for both academic research and teaching careers. Physician-scientists are in an excellent position to facilitate bench-to-bedside translation of applicable research findings.

Students must fulfill all requirements for both programs to earn both the MD and PhD degrees. As indicated in the curriculum description, some medical modules can be substituted for certain graduate courses and vice versa to help reduce redundancy and streamline time to completion of this integrated program. Students will be able to complete the MD/PhD program in as few as 6 years, although most students will likely require 7-8 years to fulfill all of the requirements. An MD/PhD program committee consisting of faculty from both the medical and graduate programs will serve as the oversight committee responsible for tracking and evaluating student progress in this program.

Students in the integrated MD/PhD Track in Biomedical Sciences must be accepted in the College of Medicine MD program and begin working on their PhD research project during the first two years of medical school. Students take medical courses during the first two years and must successfully pass the USMLE Step 1 exam at the end of year 2 prior to beginning full-time graduate studies in the Biomedical Sciences PhD Program. Required and elective graduate courses for the PhD program are completed in years 3-4 while the student is continuing research. Clinical clerkships that are typically completed in years 3-4 of medical school will in most cases be deferred until the student has completed the PhD program requirements, though some minimum level of ongoing clinical training will continue throughout the entire duration of the program. This ensures that the student remains connected with clinical education and training even while primarily focused on the graduate portion of the MD/PhD program.

The Biomedical Sciences PhD program requires a minimum of 72 credit hours beyond the bachelor's degree, including a minimum total of 27 hours of formal course work exclusive of independent study that are required. The 72 credit hours in the PhD program consists of 23 credit hours of core courses, 12 credit hours of electives, and a minimum of 15 credit hours of dissertation research. The remaining 22 credit hours may consist of additional electives, doctoral research and/or dissertation research. Students entering with a master's degree may request that up to 30 semester credit hours of previous course work be waived as degree requirements with approval from the dissertation committee.

The MD curriculum can be found here: http://med.ucf.edu/academics/md-program/integrated-curriculum/.

Programmatic deficiencies expected of applicants from diverse settings will be addressed early in the program by completion of appropriate course work. Students may register for doctoral research until they have been admitted to candidacy, after which they must register for dissertation research.

New students will rotate through at least two different laboratories to identify a faculty mentor/sponsor and research area of interest for their dissertation. Finally, a sequence of required seminars will familiarize students with field-related literature and introduce them to the conceptual and technical frameworks in which they will work. All students receiving assistantships must enroll full time.

MD/PhD students are required to maintain good academic standing in both the MD and PhD components of the curriculum. Students must first satisfactorily complete the first two years of the medical school curriculum and pass the USMLE Step 1 exam before they can begin full-time PhD enrollment.