Program Director's Welcome

Congratulations on your decision to pursue residency training in Internal Medicine! There are several important questions to consider in choosing an internal medicine program:

1. Will this program train me to be an excellent and confident clinician?


2. Will I learn how to make decisions and hone my clinical instincts and judgment?


3. Will I be able to take care of patients on my own in a supervised fashion (versus always
   having to follow an attending physician around)?


4. Is the program committed to helping me pursue my future career aspirations, whether they be fellowship or primary care-related?


5. Is there adequate diversity not only in the patients I care for, but also within the residency program itself?


6. Do the residents in the program have great camaraderie both inside and outside the hospital?

The answer to all of these questions is an emphatic YES at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. We pride ourselves on running the largest program in New Jersey and one of the premier medicine residencies in the Northeast USA. Our residents receive a first-rate educational experience that allows them to grow into mature and knowledgeable Internists. Residents are led by a robust and world-famous faculty that enjoy bedside teaching and close resident-faculty interaction. The faculty also provides "supervised autonomy" as we believe that residents learn best by 'doing' as opposed to merely 'watching'.

We have actively sought to recruit a diverse housestaff in helping to care for the extraordinarily diverse patient populations at University Hospital, the East Orange VA and Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center. At these training sites, the residents experience unmatched diversity with respect to patient illness and disease presentations.

The great strength of our program, though, is the residents themselves. They are an amazing group of individuals whom I am proud to work with on a daily basis. Lifelong friendships (and occasionally even marriages!) are created on an on-going basis, and this warm family feeling helps residents truly feel at home. That amazing feeling of comradery is the #1 reason why I completed my residency training here, and ultimately why I also chose to stay as faculty!

I strongly urge you to consider Rutgers New Jersey Medical School as a place to acquire superb training in a nurturing and comfortable environment. We will develop you into a confident, humanistic, and knowledgeable Internist prepared for clinical practice, fellowship, or academic medicine. We welcome the opportunity to meet you!

He joined our faculty in 2017 as Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine and Associate Program Director for the Internal Medicine Residency. Dr. Matassa came to us with extensive experience in medical education, through his work as a professional tutor for both the USMLE Step Exams and ABIM Internal Medicine Certification Exam.

As Associate Program Director, Dr. Matassa served as the Director of the Clinician Educator Track and the Chair of the Clinical Competency Committee. He has also co-established a primary care addiction clinic to expand our patients’access to medication-assisted therapies and counseling services.

Dr. Matassa was named Program Director in 2022. His aptitude for teaching and mentorship is well recognized at our institution. He has been given the Best Teaching Attending Award at University Hospital four times, and the medical school has presented him a Golden Apple three times. As Program Director, Dr. Matassa continues to optimize resident wellness, innovate novel curricula, and expand educational opportunities across the three training sites.