Surgical Education
General Surgery Residency Program

Goals and Objectives of PGY Level

PGY5 or Chief Resident

The Chief Resident bears great responsibility for the conduct of the residents and the implementation of the Department policies.  The Chief Resident will monitor resident interactions with patients, other health care professionals, and attendance and participation in meetings, conferences and clinical research.

The American Board of Surgery (ABS) and the ACGME Residency Review Committee (RRC) require 750 major cases over the five years including 150 major cases in the chief year. Residents may count up to 50 cases as teaching assistant toward the 750 total, but these cases may not be counted twoard the 150 chief year cases.  The chief resident will have spent,  over the five years in the accredited surgery program, no fewer than 42 months devoted to the essential content areas of general surgery.” The ABS website, www.absurgery.org, has many resources for use by individuals interested in ABS certification.

 Your experience will far exceed these numbers since our program averages over 1000 cases per five years.  The Chief Resident will be involved in all the major advanced laparoscopic cases as well as other advanced techniques including sentinel node dissections and intraoperative ultrasound.  One Chief Resident is always in charge of the general surgery clinics.  Those patients are considered the “private patients” of the chief.  The Chief Resident is in charge of all emergency room and ward consults and must communicate with the attending admitting the patient.  He/she may “book” cases in the clinic block time or as an emergency.  Any patient, who is operated upon by a Chief Resident, will be followed by at least that Chief Resident.  The Chief Resident may admit or transfer patients to appropriate services.  He/she will select patients for Morbidity and Mortality Conference, and organize the ICU, basic science, pathology, radiology conferences and the monthly “Journal Club.”  The Chief Residents at MMC and NBI will help coordinate the weekly televideo research conference and the weekly Core Curriculum basic science conference between hospitals.  At this point in residency, the PGY 5 should be working on his/her fifth paper.  The Chief Resident must assure that the academic program meets the needs of his/her fellow residents and may organize block study time.  He/she will create the monthly on-call and vacation schedule and monitor junior residents’ work hours.

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