The state Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has been downgraded to “provisional status” by the National Association of Medical Examiners, after an inspection by an accrediting agency found four major deficiencies and six minor ones.

The medical examiner’s office, which incurred a 5.75 percent cut to its $6.2 million budget in June, which required layoffs of two employees and other service reductions, said in a statement Wednesday that it has until September to correct the deficiencies and become eligible for full accreditation.

In a Jan. 31 letter to Chief Medical Examiner Dr. James Gill, the chairwoman of the association’s inspection and accreditation committee urged the office to correct the deficiencies “as completely and quickly as possible.”

“Failure to remedy satisfactorily the ... deficiencies within the allotted one year extension may result in loss of accreditation,” Dr. Barbara Wolf, the chairwoman, wrote.

The major deficiencies include inadequate staffing of medical examiners, investigators and medical records staff, and inadequate refrigerated body storage space. According to the association, the office needs to add two more medical examiners to meet its standard that each medical examiner perform no more than 325 autopsies per year. The association also said there are not enough investigators and nontechnical staff to handle the routine daily caseload and record-keeping responsibilities.

Among minor deficiencies, the association found that 90 percent of all postmortem examinations are not completed within 60 days of the autopsy. The office also was cited for having insufficient funding to provide continuing education for employees, among other findings.

After the June budget cut — the most recent in a series of budget reductions — the medical examiner’s office stopped its longstanding practice of performing toxicology tests for most sudden deaths, leaving local police departments to pay private labs up to $200 per test.

In its statement, the medical examiner's office said it is working with the state Office of Policy and Management and the Department Administrative Services to correct the staffing and facility deficiencies.

“Some of the vacant technical and non-technical staff positions already have been refilled,” the statement said. “Work on new refrigerated storage space is being put out to bid in March. The only anticipated remaining hurdle that will prevent the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner from regaining full accreditation is the need for two additional medical examiners.”

The accreditation, the statement said, “means an office performs sound and timely death investigations. This instills confidence in the police departments, attorneys and the families that are served. Loss of accreditation means that an office cannot meet the minimal standards of practice for death investigation. Mistakes by a medical examiner put people’s lives at risk, can result in the innocent imprisoned, and cost millions of dollars in civil claims.”

Linda Sylvia, spokeswoman for the office, said Gill will make his case for a budget increase during a public hearing of the state Legislature’s Appropriations Committee on Feb. 23. She declined to comment further.

New London State's Attorney Michael L. Regan said he does not expect the “provisional status” of the medical examiner’s office will impact any current investigations within his office.

“It could be more of an issue for court cases at trial,” he said.

Kevin T. Kane, the chief state’s attorney, said he is hopeful the problems with the office can be resolved quickly. While the status of the office is not posing any immediate problems, he said, defense attorneys could use information about the accreditation status to try to discredit evidence presented during criminal trials. However, other than delays in completing some autopsies and other work, Kane said the office has been providing good service.

“It’s not a crisis right now,” he said. “Maybe things are a little slower, but the quality of the medical examiner’s work has been good, and the medical examiner’s testimony has been good.”

j.benson@theday.com