Fellowship Accreditation

• Review Process


• Program Requirements


• Preparing your ACGME Application


• Timeline


• Fees


• ACGME Contact Information

The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) is a private, non-profit organization responsible for the accreditation of post-MD medical training programs within the United States. Training programs seeking accreditation will need to substantially comply with the ACGME common and specialty-specific program requirements and then complete a Program Information Form (PIF) to apply for accreditation by ACGME. ACGME accredited GME programs must operate under the authority and control of a sponsoring institution. To view the definition and requirements of a sponsoring institution, click here.

Review Process

For hospice and palliative medicine, the work of reviewing specific programs and making accreditation decisions will be carried out by the Family Medicine Review Committee (RC) of the ACGME. In an effort to streamline the process in its initial years, ACGME has formed a Hospice and Palliative Care Advisory Group to review applications first and provide comments to the Family Medicine RC. At least one member of the advisory group will be present at the RC meetings to assist.

Applications judged to be in substantial compliance with the requirements will have July 1 as the effective date of accreditation. Applications judged to be non-compliant with the requirements will have the opportunity to respond to the RC's concerns/citations.  

Program Requirements

In February 2008, ACGME approved the program requirements for fellowship education in hospice and palliative medicine.

All program directors will need to become familiar with the following key documents available on the ACGME Website in order to apply for accreditation and complete the application:

• Program Requirements (Institutional and Common requirements that apply to all specialties and subspecialties)
• Subspecialty Program Requirements (Specific requirements for HPM programs)
• Companion Document (Core competencies for HPM fellowship training)
• HPM FAQ's (Clarification of common questions within the Program Information Form)
   

Preparing your ACGME Application

ACGME has posted the Program Information Form (PIF), or application, on their website. To view the application, click here.

Additional postings on the ACGME Website intended to assist program directors in applying for accreditation include: a Hospice and Palliative Medicine FAQ and "How to Apply for Accreditation in 7 Easy Steps".

Hospice programs will be considered for accreditation only if the sponsoring institution also sponsors an ACGME-accredited program in at least one of the following specialties: Anesthesia, Emergency Medicine, Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, Neurology, Psychiatry, Obstetrics and Gynecology, Pediatrics, Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Radiation Oncology or Surgery.

All applications for a new program must be initiated by the Sponsoring Institution Designated Institutional Official (DIO) using the Accreditation Data System (ADS) found on the ACGME home page.

Members-only resource: Several presentation from the March 2007 and 2008 Fellowship Program Summit are available in the members-only section of the AAHPM Web site to assist you with preparing your PIF. Remember you'll need to login to the members-only section to access these helpful resources.

Timeline

The Family Medicine RRC will review applications during their bi-annual meetings, making announcements shortly thereafter. This first review process will be paper only (i.e., no site visit required).

ACGME has posted an announcment on their Web site under "Updates from the RRC" with application dealines. PIFs will be due 3 months prior to the Family Medicine RRC scheduled meetings.

RRC Meeting - May 18-20, 2009
HPM Applications due February 17, 2009

RRC Meeting - September 23-25, 2009
HPM Applications due June 22, 2009

Fees

The fee for a new program application is $4,000. ACGME assesses an annual accreditation fee on a per program basis for all accredited programs. The annual fee is $2,750 for programs with five or fewer residents/fellows and $3,500 for programs with more than five residents/fellows. This fee is billed around January 1 of each year and applies to the current academic year.

ACGME Contact Information

Visit the ACGME Web site at http://www.acgme.org/ to learn more. Visit the Family Medicine RC Web page and select "Find Staff Contacts by Subject" to answer your specific questions.