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AGENCY TESTIMONY
Medical examiner shortage and recruitment efforts
3:40:03
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166 sec
Dr. Graham addresses the severe shortage of medical examiners, a national problem affecting OCME, and outlines the agency's efforts to adapt and recruit new forensic pathologists.
- OCME's staff of full-time forensic pathologists has decreased to about two-thirds of the previous year's level
- The agency completed an operational realignment to optimize staffing across two forensic pathology centers
- A new contract agreement with the Doctors Council SEIU aims to deliver wage increases and bonuses to help retain and recruit medical examiners
- OCME's forensic pathology fellowship program remains a leading training program, attracting qualified candidates
- The agency is using locum tenens to add board-certified forensic pathologists on a temporary basis
Jason Graham
3:40:03
As we adjust to our new equilibrium, OCME continues to grapple with the severe shortage of medical examiners, the highly trained forensic pathologists who are the namesake and in many ways the bedrock of our agency since its founding in 1918.
3:40:17
This national problem was not created overnight nor will it be solved in a matter of months.
3:40:23
In fact, our situation grew more challenging over the past year as we continued to lose medical examiners often due to relocations to other jurisdictions.
3:40:32
Our staff of full time forensic pathologists today stands at approximately two thirds of where it stood this time last year, and permanently growing their ranks will require the cultivation of a new generation of doctors specializing in this noble work to meet the urgent national demand.
3:40:47
In the meantime, we are adapting to support our medical examiners because resilience is a core value at OCME.
3:40:55
We completed an operational realignment in September to optimize our staffing and resources across two forensic pathology centers in Manhattan and Brooklyn in the interest of upholding the highest quality of service for New Yorkers.
3:41:07
As a part of this process, we've strengthened our engagement and bonds with the community, updating autopsy protocols to accommodate religious requirements and meeting with faith based and community leaders.
3:41:19
Concurrent with the successful realignment, we've begun implementing postmortem computed tomography, or CT scanning, into our operations.
3:41:26
CT scanners help medical examiners with diagnosis and facilitate religious objections to autopsy, while also hoping in the future to increase the potential number of eligible tissue donations that can save lives.
3:41:38
In mid December, the administration reached a tentative five year contract agreement with the Doctors Council Service Employees International Union, as Chair Schulman mentioned.
3:41:47
That's to deliver wage increases and bonuses for our medical examiners, which will help us retain and recruit these highly skilled professionals who continue to be in demand by medical examiner's offices across the nation.
3:41:58
Our renowned forensic pathology fellowship program remains among the leading training programs in the nation, attracting physicians who want to specialize while immersed in the most comprehensive resources of any medical examiner's office in the country.
3:42:11
We continue to hire from the ranks of our graduates every year, and I'm pleased to report that for the academic year twenty twenty six-twenty twenty seven, we have a record number of highly qualified candidates, and we hope to match applicants for all six of our coveted fellowship seats, reaffirming the New York City OCME as the largest training program of its kind in the nation.
3:42:30
To further bolster the ranks of medical examiners during this period, we're using locum tenens to add additional board certified forensic pathologists for casework on a temporary basis.
3:42:41
Locums provide a mechanism to employ highly qualified forensic medicine physicians to help fill gaps in coverage on a part time basis.