Concerns for patient health: Doctors at Kaplan Hospital not fully trained

An audit committee of the Scientific Council of the Israel Medical Association found serious deficiencies in how residents in the combined cardiology and internal medicine track have been trained over the years at the Kaplan Medical Center in Rehovot. According to the committee's findings, residents skipped parts of the required training in internal medicine, and the residency logs recorded training that, according to the findings, was not actually performed.

According to the report by Channel 13, the investigation was opened following a complaint from a resident doctor. According to the minutes of the Scientific Council's presidency, this is a practice that has been entrenched for several years. The committee heard from the head of the cardiology department, the head of the internal medicine department, the hospital management, as well as residents and specialists who completed the combined track.

Following the findings, the presidency of the Scientific Council recommended removing the accreditation of the cardiology department at Kaplan as a place for training residents as long as Professor Kobi George is part of the department's staff. In addition, it was recommended that George should not be able to manage a department recognized for residency in the future. Regarding Internal Medicine Department A, conditional accreditation was recommended for six months, and for the next 3 years, signatures on residency documents will be required to be accompanied by the signature of the hospital's deputy director.

The Scientific Council also recommended checking the residency of the doctors who completed the combined track individually, and determining whether completion of parts of the training is required based on the findings. At the same time, Clalit announced the establishment of a dedicated committee that will deal with the implementation and monitoring of the recommendations, and stated that the Ministry of Health has been updated on the matter.

Professor Kobi George rejected the claims and stated that all cardiology residents and specialists underwent the required training and accumulated the necessary experience. According to him, the Scientific Council's recommendations are fundamentally flawed and were adopted through an improper procedure, and there is no binding decision by the Ministry of Health on the matter. Clalit stated that it regrets the incident and is working to correct the deficiencies found in the report. No response was received from Kaplan Hospital.