Dr. McBride named to ASMBS Council

Corrigan McBride, MD, professor and chief of minimally invasive and bariatric surgery at the University of Nebraska Medical Center has been elected to the executive council of the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery (ASMBS).

Dr. McBride will serve a three-year term. Founded in 1983, the ASMBS is the largest national society for this specialty. The vision of the ASMBS is to improve public health and well-being by lessening the burden of the disease of obesity and related diseases throughout the world.

Dr. McBride said the election to the executive council is an honor.

“This really recognizes the work I’ve done for the society to improve fellow education in the realm of bariatric surgery and moving it to a competency-based curriculum that incorporates Entrustable Professional Activities (EPA) as an evaluation tool,” she said.

Since 2015, Dr. McBride has been working toward a clear designation of bariatric surgery as a general surgery subspecialty and a focused practice designation with the American Board of Surgery.

Dr. McBride began looking at how competency is measured at the medical school, resident and fellowship levels. Traditionally, it is measured by the number of times a student, fellow or resident has performed a particular procedure.

“UNMC’s minimally invasive bariatrics fellowship has been an active participant in several pilots to make this curriculum change,” Dr. McBride said.

Dr. McBride established EPA measurements that evaluate whether a trainee is considered proficient enough to be trusted to perform the procedure without direct supervision.

“It’s been proven as a superior tool in assessing the competency and proficiency of the trainee,” Dr. McBride said.

Because of her foundational work in designing new EPAs for competency evaluation, the American Board of Surgery is working in partnership with the ASMBS to establish bariatric surgery as the first focused practice sub-designation.

Dr. McBride also is an examination consultant for the new focused practice designation for bariatric surgery. She will formulate questions used on the national exam which is expected to roll out in February 2022.