Berkshire Medical Center has lost its bid to have its general surgery residency program reinstated.
The Pittsfield-based hospital has lost its general surgery residency accreditation following a site visit last April that found documentation deficiencies. Program eligibility is determined by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, or ACGME.
“The documentation that we provided while it was accurate was not presented to them in the manner that they wanted it,” said Michael Leary, BMC's spokesman. “In some instances it was contained in emails as opposed to actual printed policy documents. I can say at no time did the ACGME find any issues with the clinical quality of the program and the residency decertification was not related in any way to surgical care for patients at BMC.”
The program’s director, Dr. Timothy Counihan, resigned in February, but remains at the hospital. BMC was notified last November that the residency program would be revoked this summer, according to Leary.
“We appealed that decision based on what we considered a failure of due process and that appeal was unfortunately denied,” Leary said. “We’re disappointed by the decision of the ACGME, but we do understand their reason for the denial and we respect the process. We have corrected all of the documentation deficiencies that were cited by the ACGME and we did so immediately after the notification and before presenting our appeal.”
ACGME’s accreditation process does not take into account actions taken after the site review. Dr. John Potts is ACGME’s senior vice president for surgical accreditation. He would not comment on the specifics of BMC’s case.
“Very few programs are in complete compliance with every requirement, but the standard that’s used by our organization is that programs remain in substantial compliance with those requirements,” said Potts.
The general surgery residency program at BMC was established more than 50 years ago. BMC also has an osteopathic residency program under the general surgery umbrella accredited by a separate organization. Leary says that will continue as will residency programs in the fields of internal medicine, psychiatrics and dentistry. He says BMC hopes to get the general surgery program reaccredited.
“We will be submitting a new application later this year to the ACGME for a new program,” Leary said. “We’re confident that we will be able to initiate that new program in the summer of 2015.”
If an organization applies within two years of losing its accreditation, the program must address all the citations found. If the program were to wait beyond two years, its slate would be wiped clean.
Potts adds that the length of an accreditation process varies case by case, but if all the stars align one could be completed within six months. Rather than doing site visits every few years and having programs fill out an extensive form, ACGME now collects initial data elements annually without going to a site unless deemed necessary. With an increased focus on students’ educational results and patient outcomes, Potts says ACGME wants to stay out of the way of the majority of the more than 9,300 programs it oversees that are performing well.
“We want to identify the programs that have short-comings and help those programs improve,” said Potts.
Leary says the remaining students in the program were placed in other residencies elsewhere.
