Jersey City Medical Center Patients To Benefit From Fellowship

JERSEY CITY, NJ —The Jersey City Medical Center announced Tuesday that it will join the Rutgers Health/New Jersey Medical School Gastroenterology fellowship, which will benefit both patients and medical professionals, officials from Jersey City Medical Center said.

As a result of the program, Jersey Medical Center, an RWJBarnabas Health facility, will become a major teaching site to train tomorrow's gastroenterologists. This will give patients access to doctors who are learning the newest techniques from some of the most experienced and accomplished gastroenterologists in New Jersey.

"This is a great step forward for Jersey City Medical Center and patients in the region," said Dr. Michael Loftus, chief medical officer of Jersey City Medical Center. "We are an academic medical center with residents in many specialties and having fellows is the next level of training."

The Jersey City Medical Center already has a long tradition as a teaching hospital, with residencies offered in internal medicine, dental medicine, obstetrics and gynecology and pharmacy, though the fellowship training in gastroenterology is a first for the hospital, according to a release.

Starting next year, two additional fellowship positions will be added to the Rutgers New Jersey Medical School Gastroenterology program, and fellows will begin rotating through Jersey City Medical Center, officials said. One of the new positions will be dedicated to research and the other will be clinical.

Dr. Neil Kothari, associate dean for graduate medical education at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, said having fellows at a hospital results in better clinical care.

"Everything that gets done must be evidence-based," Kothari said. "The hospital needs to have the latest in technology and the latest in clinical care techniques. This is going to be a blockbuster program. We're excited for all the things that we're going to be able to do together.”

Kothari said the fellows also will benefit from spending time in Jersey City.

"Jersey City has one of the most diverse populations in the state and we believe that incredible demographic will really help to broaden the range of clinical diseases that the fellows in gastroenterology will be able to see," Kothari said. "It will also enhance their training in cultural diversity."

According to a release, the gastroenterology fellowship at Jersey City Medical Center is part of a 2018 partnership between RWJBarnabas Health and Rutgers University, which is designed to enhance research and medical and health professional education, improve access to care and reduce health disparities in New Jersey.

Rutgers Health, which includes all graduate medical education programs at Rutgers, is now the fifth largest sponsor of graduate medical education in the nation with more than 140 different training programs and 1,500 residents and fellows across the state.

"We are creating a new academic health system that brings together the enormous clinical strength of RWJBarnabas Health with the educational and research excellence at Rutgers University," Kothari said. "Together, we are driving transformative healthcare forward through our collaboration."