The Rio Grande Valley’s only accredited internal medicine residency program – at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio’s Regional Academic Health Center (RAHC) in Harlingen – recently gained four-year accreditation by the Accreditation Council on Graduate Medical Education.
Accreditation is the process by which residency programs, which train new physicians, are judged as conforming to national graduate medical education standards. The RAHC program’s achievement was made possible by the Health Science Center’s outstanding clinical partners, including its primary teaching hospital, Valley Baptist Medical Center in Harlingen; its ambulatory teaching site, Su Clinica Familiar; and hundreds of Valley physicians.
“This is great news,” said Leonel Vela, M.D., M.P.H., regional dean of the RAHC. “Our internal medicine residents have a 100 percent pass rate on board certification examinations. We are training excellent physicians to address the significant medical workforce shortcomings in the Valley. The RAHC program in Harlingen is so important because physicians tend to stay in the areas where they did their residencies.”
Dr. Vela also cited James Hanley III, M.D., director of the internal medicine residency program, for his leadership.
Internal medicine physicians serve as quarterbacks for patient care. They examine patient medical histories, perform physical examinations and make recommendations about the paths of patient treatment.
