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The Board of Trustees approved a plan at its meeting in Washington, D.C. last month to reform APA fellowship categories in an effort to respond to members’ requests to make it easier to achieve the coveted status. Many members had registered dismay that physician colleagues in other medical specialty organizations had a less-daunting path to the fellowship designation. The Assembly had endorsed the new fellowship categories earlier this year.
The restructuring of the APA fellowship system, if finally endorsed by a vote of the APA membership, will qualify members to become fellows once they complete five consecutive years as a general member. Members would have to fulfill three additional criteria to be named a fellow - being certified by either the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, or the American Osteopathic Association; providing three letters of recommendation from current APA fellows; and having their district branch and the APA Membership Committee concur that the member merits fellowship status.
Members who are already APA fellows and have had to meet more demanding criteria will all become distinguished fellows once the plan takes effect. Distinguished fellows - a category that now consists primarily of physicians who are not psychiatrists - would have their designation changed to honorary fellow, which will place them in a category now reserved solely for nonphysicians.
The broad range of achievement currently needed to qualify for fellowship would transfer to the distinguished fellowship category under the new system.
Because APA’s fellowship categories are included in the Association’s Constitution and Bylaws, the changes endorsed by the Board last month will be reviewed by APA’s Constitution and Bylaws Committee.
A 1995 survey of 18 medical specialty organizations conducted by the APA Office of Membership found that APA’s fellowship criteria were by far the most stringent and most extensive. All but one of the medical groups that were surveyed use board certification as the primary criterion for fellowship eligibility. The second most frequently cited requirement was that the fellowship applicant be practicing the specialty - a criterion noted by half of the respondents. Seven organizations want letters of recommendation to accompany all fellowship applications, while two require attendance at annual meetings to qualify for their fellowship designation.