Credentialing protocols used by internal medicine residency programs in New York State

Abstract

In the fall of 1988, the Association of Program Directors in Internal Medicine established a New York State (NYS) Task Force to assess the impact of the “Report of the New York State Ad Hoc Advisory Committee on Emergency Services–Supervision and Residents' Working Conditions.” Fifty-eight of the 62 NYS internal medicine residencies were surveyed in 1989 and 21 provided copies of their credentialing protocols. Analysis of these protocols identified eight essentials of a viable credentialing protocol, including five present in a majority of the examined protocols. The study produced a master list of procedures with a corresponding range of certification criteria and confirmed most programs had undergone parallel development of remarkably similar protocols, suggesting that a uniform credentialing system was possible and warranted further study.