Single Accreditation Updates and Fall Convention/OMED Summary

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iwillnevergiveup

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Single Accreditation Updates


Public Listing of Transitioning Programs


Fellowship Eligibility

  • One of the driving forces behind the single accreditation change was the establishment of the Common Program Requirements by the ACGME. These requirements mandate that as of July 1, 2016, only those physicians who trained in ACGME accredited programs would be eligible for fellowship training in ACGME fellowships. This would have drastically limited the fellowship training options of osteopathic graduates.
  • The single accreditation pathway will thus protect future osteopathic graduates' access to fellowship training, by ensuring that all osteopathic graduates train in programs that are accredited by the ACGME.
  • The following quotes are directly from the ACGME's Single Accreditation FAQ regarding the residency requirements to seek fellowship training:
    • "Some disciplines do accept AOA-approved prerequisite training as eligible for entry into ACGME-accredited fellowships. Others require that prerequisite training occur only in ACGME-accredited programs for such eligibility. Starting July 1, 2016, eligibility requirements for all fellowship positions will require completion of prerequisite training in a program accredited by the ACGME, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada (RCPSC) or the College of Family Physicians of Canada (CFPC). Between July 1, 2015 and June 30, 2020, a resident who completes prerequisite training in an AOA-approved program with pre-accreditation status will be subject to the ACGME fellowship eligibility standards (per subspecialty) that were in effect June 30, 2013 or July 1, 2016, whichever is less restrictive."
    • "Pre-accreditation status of an AOA-approved program cannot be made retroactive for residents who complete the program before it receives pre-accreditation status. Residents who complete an AOA-approved program upon completion of Academic Year 2014- 2015 will have done so before their program could achieve pre-accreditation status. Their eligibility status for ACGME-accredited fellowships will be determined by the subspecialty requirements in effect for the beginning of the fellowship program. Some Review Committees permit an exception to the 2016 eligibility requirements for prior training. Program directors should contact their specialty Review Committee staff to determine if an applicant is eligible or if the program can petition for an exception."

Protecting Osteopathic Graduates

  • As of July 1, 2020, the AOA will no longer be accrediting residency programs. The AOA has put policies in place that prevent AOA residency programs who have not applied for ACGME accreditation from accepting new residency matriculants who would not graduate residency before July 1, 2020. This will protect students from matching into programs that may be unaccredited when they graduate residency.

The Match

  • The allopathic match is not managed by the ACGME. Thus, the ACGME has no influence on which programs are listed in the allopathic match.
  • As osteopathic residency programs achieve initial accreditation with the ACGME, they will be eligible to be listed in either matching service. Fewer and fewer programs are expected be listed in the AOA match. The AOA realizes the utility of the AOA match will decline. The AOA will encourage all programs to list with the National Residency Matching Program (NRMP, the allopathic match) once they receive initial accreditation, to expedite the transition between matches.
  • A unified match benefits osteopathic students, by allowing us to apply to and rank allopathic and osteopathic programs side by side.
  • There is no formal timeline for the transition between matching services. However, as previously stated, AOA programs that have not applied for ACGME accreditation can not accept residents who would not graduate by July 1, 2020. Therefore, any AOA program accepting residents out of the Class of 2018 will be eligible to be listed in the NRMP. This will likely be the endpoint of the AOA match.
  • In the meantime, programs are individually responsible for transitioning between matching services once initial accreditation is achieved. This means that you should contact the programs directly to inquire which matching service they will be listed in.

Matching into advanced PGY-2 Positions


The COMLEX

  • The COMLEX examination will continue to be the osteopathic board examination.
  • Recall that the purpose of the COMLEX is not as a tool for residencies to stratify student qualifications, but rather as a set of examinations to prove to the public that graduating physicians meet a minimum standard of competency to practice medicine in the United States.
  • The above statement considered, SOMA understands that board examination scores are used by residency programs to evaluate candidates. At present, 77% of ACGME programs accept COMLEX scores to satisfy their applications requirements. With the implementation of single accreditation, this percentage will rise. COMLEX will likely also be accepted by more programs who have historically not accepted it, as the visibility of DOs in the ACGME increases.

The USMLE

  • All osteopathic students should evaluate on a program to program basis whether or not taking USMLE will be important. Investigate whether or not programs you are interested in require USMLE scores. If in doubt, call the programs and ask which, if any, USMLE steps you may need to take.
  • If you are considering a competitive specialty, or you are completely unsure as to which specialty you will pursue, taking the USMLE and scoring well will only keep doors open to you in the future.

Timelines of the Transition Period

  • Once an AOA residency program applies for ACGME accreditation, it is given pre-accreditation status if its application is deemed to be in good order.
  • The ACGME will then send a team to do a site review on the program and report back to the Residency Review Committee (RRC) for that specialty.
  • The ACGME must review all applications within one year and determine whether or not to award the program initial accreditation.
  • This process may take only a few months, or it may take up to one year. The timelines are not clear. The application and review process is not new to the ACGME or the RRCs, but this level of application volume is new to them.
  • In the 'Program Search' tab on opportunities.osteopathic.org, there is a listing of each program's responses regarding their plans for the single accreditation system. Some of these responses have not been submitted and some of the sections may be incomplete.
  • The best course of action for students is still to contact the programs they are interested in applying to and asking them to clarify where they stand in the single accreditation process (i.e. working on application vs. application submitted/pre-accreditation vs. initial accreditation has been conferred).

Important ones in bold.
The single match is coming. It's the question of when, but I suspect most will make the transition by 2019/2020.

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EM, urology, general surgery, and orthopedic surgery programs all applied for Single Accreditation System and none of them so far have applied for Osteopathic Recognition from the ACGME. (Didn't check for others b/c idc)

EM: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=10
Urology: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=105
General surgery: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=99
Orthopedic surgery: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=42

This means starting from class of 2019, DO students will be directly competing with MD students for these spots. (Correct me if I'm wrong)
 
the answers to questions about single accreditation are slowly shifting away from a choice between 1. ask someone else or 2. wait
 
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Interesting to see some MD family medicine/IM residency programs applying for Osteopathic Focus.

Western Michigan University Homer Stryker MD School of Medicine Program
Penn State Milton S Hershey Medical Center/State College Program
The University of Montana Program
University of Wisconsin (Madison) Program
 
Maybe I'm missing it somewhere in there, but if you're in a program that transitions from pre-accredited to accredited while in the middle of residency, are you considered a graduate of an ACGME residency (because that would affect fellowship, for some programs the pre-2013 rules state that 75% of the fellowship positions would go to ACGME residency graduates)
 
"Therefore, any AOA program accepting residents out of the Class of 2018 will be eligible to be listed in the NRMP. This will likely be the endpoint of the AOA match."

All I needed to hear.
 
"Therefore, any AOA program accepting residents out of the Class of 2018 will be eligible to be listed in the NRMP. This will likely be the endpoint of the AOA match."

All I needed to hear.

It's good to have the AOA leadership come out and say what we've been speculating would happen for a while.
 
As an Osteopathic MS, I believe this transition benefits not only DOs, but in general the title of a physician as a whole. It's time we unite.
 
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EM, urology, general surgery, and orthopedic surgery programs all applied for Single Accreditation System and none of them so far have applied for Osteopathic Recognition from the ACGME. (Didn't check for others b/c idc)

EM: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=10
Urology: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=105
General surgery: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=99
Orthopedic surgery: https://apps.acgme.org/ads/Public/Reports/ReportRun?ReportId=18&CurrentYear=2015&SpecialtyId=42

This means starting from class of 2019, DO students will be directly competing with MD students for these spots. (Correct me if I'm wrong)

I am guess if the program is already approved, it can choose to be in the NRMP match. So DO students could actually be competing against MD sooner than 2019. It is just that more and more programs will add themselves to the NRMP match as time goes by until around 2020. Well, glad to know the unified match will happen.
 
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Maybe I'm missing it somewhere in there, but if you're in a program that transitions from pre-accredited to accredited while in the middle of residency, are you considered a graduate of an ACGME residency (because that would affect fellowship, for some programs the pre-2013 rules state that 75% of the fellowship positions would go to ACGME residency graduates)

In this case, I believe pre-accreditation will be the point in which the programs will be considered fulfilling of requirements. In other words, if you start at a program that has pre-accreditation, then that programs gets initial accreditation while you're there, I believe your training will be considered "ACGME training" for the purpose of attaining fellowships. If you are at a program that doesn't have pre-accreditation when you start, but over the course of your training gets it and eventually initial accreditation, then it will likely be program/RC specific whether they consider it "ACGME training". Also be sure to check board certification groups for their requirements, as some require that >2/3 or >3/4 of your training be completed at an ACGME program.

This may seem very complicated for those of us in the transition, but I believe that in practice it won't be. Most board committees I doubt would bar graduates of ACGME programs from getting certified, but you may have to put in more legwork to get eligibility. In addition, I think most fellowships will also recognize that this is a transition time and more likely than not they may be completely oblivious as to when exactly your program attained pre-accreditation or initial accreditation status.

I am guess if the program is already approved, it can choose to be in the NRMP match. So DO students could actually be competing against MD sooner than 2019. It is just that more and more programs will add themselves to the NRMP match as time goes by until around 2020. Well, glad to know the unified match will happen.

Once a program gets initial accreditation (essentially when its actually accredited by the ACGME) then it should be able to participate in the NRMP match. That process could take up to a year (according to them) after an application is submitted.

This link was also in the email from SOMA that contained the updates in the OP. If you submit your questions I think you'll get direct answers from leadership.

https://docs.google.com/a/studentdo...6QxfGbeQCJl_NahahdUZHyHi_r6g/viewform?c=0&w=1

Yeah, I asked questions in that a couple weeks ago and they weren't really answered.
 
Yeah, I asked questions in that a couple weeks ago and they weren't really answered.
This submission form was specific to the SOMA email quoted in the OP. It hasn't been around a couple weeks.
 
In this case, I believe pre-accreditation will be the point in which the programs will be considered fulfilling of requirements. .

I certainly hope so, it's just I haven't seen anything official stating that (which, unfortunately is a common theme, maybe because they don't know yet)
 
"Therefore, any AOA program accepting residents out of the Class of 2018 will be eligible to be listed in the NRMP. This will likely be the endpoint of the AOA match."

All I needed to hear.

So this means that if you are graduating in the class of 2018 that you will be competing directly against MD, and that there will be a single match?
 
So this means that if you are graduating in the class of 2018 that you will be competing directly against MD, and that there will be a single match?
Pretty much, other programs that aren't in the NRMP match can't take residents.
 
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