The Cost of Compliance: The Financial Burden of Fulfilling Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education and American Board of Surgery Requirements

Abstract

There has been a significant increase in the number of regulatory requirements for general surgery graduate medical education (GME) programs over the last 20 years from the governing bodies of the American Board of Surgery (ABS) and the Accreditation Council of Graduate Medical Education (ACGME). We endeavored to calculate the cost to general surgery GME programs of regulatory requirements. We examined the requirements for General Surgery ABS Certification as well as the 2017 ACGME Program Requirements in General Surgery for all mandates that require funding by the surgery program to achieve. The requirements requiring funding include certification in Advanced Cardiac Life Support, Advanced Trauma Life Support, Fundamentals of Laparoscopic Surgery, Fundamentals of Endoscopic Surgery; access to medical references; simulation capability, program director protected time (30%); program coordinator salary (Association for Hospital Medical Education reported mean); and faculty time devoted to morbidity and mortality conference, journal club, Clinical Competency Committee, and Program Evaluation Committee. We then identified the cost of each mandate based on the average program in the United States of 5 residents per year in 5 clinical years. Total cost for the average program per year as the result of ABS or ACGME mandate equaled a minimum of $227,043. The ABS associated costs are $8900 per year. The ACGME associated costs are $218,143. The cost of program director and faculty time to meet the minimum ACGME requirements equaled $159,600. The most significant cost associated with mandates set forth by the ABS and ACGME are program director and faculty time devoted to resident education and evaluation. Recognition of this cost burden by institutions and policymakers for the allocation of funds is important to maintain strong general surgery GME programs.