SUNY Downstate Receives Full 5-year Re-accreditation from Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education
Jan 13, 2012
SUNY Downstate Medical Center, as a sponsor of medical residency and fellowship programs, has received a full, five-year institutional re-accreditation from the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), which is responsible for the accreditation of post-MD medical training programs in the United States. Accreditation is accomplished through a peer-review process and is based upon established standards and guidelines.
As part of its mission to provide excellence in education, research, and clinical
care with an emphasis on urban health concerns, SUNY Downstate sponsors graduate medical
education for more than 1,000 residents and fellows in over 50 specialties and subspecialties.
These residents train at Downstate’s University Hospital of Brooklyn and 32 affiliated
sites.
Ian L. Taylor, MD, PhD, senior vice president for biomedical education and research
and dean of the College of Medicine at SUNY Downstate, said, “I am very pleased that
we have received a full renewal of accreditation of our residency and fellowship training
programs. This vote of confidence from ACGME reflects the outstanding contributions
made by our residents to the health of the people of Brooklyn and the region. They
make us proud. It also testifies to the hard work and dedication to the highest of
standards on the part of our faculty and program directors.”
Stephen Wadowski, MD, associate dean for graduate medical education, noted, “This
is the highest level of accreditation possible and is awarded only to the top-performing
institutions. In granting the re-accreditation, the ACGME Institutional Review Committee
commended SUNY Downstate for being in substantial compliance with institutional standards.”
Several of Downstate’s training programs are among the largest in New York City or
the metropolitan area. For example, Emergency Medicine, Gastroenterology, Neurology,
and the combined Internal Medicine/Emergency Medicine Programs are the largest in
the five boroughs. Pediatrics, with 93 residents, is the largest in the City and second
largest in the metropolitan region. Ophthalmology and Child Neurology are tied for
the largest in the City. In addition, Critical Care Anesthesiology, Pediatric Nephrology,
and Pediatric Pulmonology are one of only three such programs in the City, and Internal
Medicine/Emergency Medicine is one of only two. The Pediatric Endocrine Program has
the greatest number of fellows in the region.
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About SUNY Downstate Medical Center
SUNY Downstate Medical Center, founded in 1860, was the first medical school in the United States to bring teaching out of the lecture hall and to the patient’s bedside. A center of innovation and excellence in research and clinical service delivery, SUNY Downstate Medical Center comprises a College of Medicine, College of Nursing, School of Health Professions, a School of Graduate Studies, School of Public Health, University Hospital of Brooklyn, and a multifaceted biotechnology initiative including the Downstate Biotechnology Incubator and BioBAT for early-stage and more mature companies, respectively.
SUNY Downstate ranks twelfth nationally in the number of alumni who are on the faculty of American medical schools. More physicians practicing in New York City have graduated from SUNY Downstate than from any other medical school.