By Jay Greene , AMNews staff. April 17, 2000. Additional information Frustrated by lack of funds, increased administrative duties and the pressure to work residents more than supervise and teach them, a record number of residency program directors quit last year and went back to full-time clinical practice or research, according to the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. The high turnover of residency program directors is one reason for the increased number of citations and adverse accreditation actions last year involving resident supervision and work hours, residency experts say. In response, many of the 26 specialty associations are beefing up educational and professional development support services.
Residents are in for three to seven years.
If they have three to four different directors, the continuity of the educational experience suffers. Dr. Leach said program directors are caught between providing labor to cover shifts at medical centers and giving residents the best educational environment. Declining federal funding for graduate medical education and lack of institutional support for program directors also is contributing to director dissatisfaction and turnover, he said. Funding is threatened and in some cases actually substantially reduced. We have a big budget problem, a shortfall, and everyone is getting scared about losing residents and the effects on programs.