Anyone using Ophthoquestions?

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As it's new, my guess is nobody will really know until after the WQE or OKAPs.

I think it's a good concept....but....it's a little off putting that many of the "experts" are fellows or relatively new to practice. Not many academics. Are they writing the questions? To be frank, how do you know that they "think" like the ABO?
 
umsami said:
As it's new, my guess is nobody will really know until after the WQE or OKAPs.

I think it's a good concept....but....it's a little off putting that many of the "experts" are fellows or relatively new to practice. Not many academics. Are they writing the questions? To be frank, how do you know that they "think" like the ABO?
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The real question is: do you want a 70-year-old person who still does extracaps writing review questions? Or do you want an enthusiastic contributor who just took their boards writing the content?

In any case, OQ is not meant to give you questions verbatim from the test. That would be illegal and unsavory. What we do instead is provide a comprehensive database of questions to enhance your review of this vast material. OQ is and will never be a shortcut to pass your boards. That is up to the test-taker him/herself.

The best part of OQ is that it will evolve rapidly over the years to come....especially with contributions and feedback from you all. I doubt any review book is as dynamic as OQ.

Anyways, best of luck to everyone in the upcoming weeks!

-OQ
 
I just purchased the ophtho questions and must say the questions are pretty good and have good explanation.
 
OphthoQuestions said:
The real question is: do you want a 70-year-old person who still does extracaps writing review questions? Or do you want an enthusiastic contributor who just took their boards writing the content?
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Honestly, I think you need both. You do need people with years of experience, specifically in thinking how the Board thinks. It's not like the WQE is straight-forward by any means. LOL Don't discount the old guys--they might be a good source of images and questions for your company. There are some docs who simply love teaching--and kind of are at a loss when they retire. They might be a good source for you guys.

You also need enthusiastic young contributors as well.

I don't expect you guys to do what the Radiologists have been accused of doing. 😉

Have you heard anything about the ABO changing the eligibility to having to wait 3 years post residency to take the WQE? Apparently, the ABMS is suggesting that for its board...and also putting a 4 year time limit (7 years in total from finishing your residency). That's going to make it harder as people will be more focused on their specialties. http://www.modernmedicine.com/modernmedicine/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=758815&cid=PRAC
 
umsami said:
Honestly, I think you need both. You do need people with years of experience, specifically in thinking how the Board thinks. It's not like the WQE is straight-forward by any means. LOL Don't discount the old guys--they might be a good source of images and questions for your company. There are some docs who simply love teaching--and kind of are at a loss when they retire. They might be a good source for you guys.

You also need enthusiastic young contributors as well.

I don't expect you guys to do what the Radiologists have been accused of doing. 😉

Have you heard anything about the ABO changing the eligibility to having to wait 3 years post residency to take the WQE? Apparently, the ABMS is suggesting that for its board...and also putting a 4 year time limit (7 years in total from finishing your residency). That's going to make it harder as people will be more focused on their specialties. http://www.modernmedicine.com/modernmedicine/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=758815&cid=PRAC
Click to expand...

True, true true. In version 2.0 of OQ, we are going to be adding a bunch of new Contributors...young and old. We don't discriminate based on age 🙂 My only point was that a 70-year-old is unlikely to know what the current WQE stresses, etc.

The whole board-certification process is too prolonged as it is. To make people wait 3 years before taking their boards is rather ludicrous if you ask me. They should make the process more like Radiology where you get the majority of the certification process out of the way during residency. There is no rationale to prolonging the pain. I also would like to know the rationale for the $1650 fee that is charged to sit for the exam.

-OQ
 
OphthoQuestions said:
The whole board-certification process is too prolonged as it is. To make people wait 3 years before taking their boards is rather ludicrous if you ask me. They should make the process more like Radiology where you get the majority of the certification process out of the way during residency. There is no rationale to prolonging the pain. I also would like to know the rationale for the $1650 fee that is charged to sit for the exam.

-OQ
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Agreed on the Radiology bit. The three year waiting thing makes no sense to me. None at all. But so far the Board hasn't adopted that...although I'm sure if they did, the fail rate (and thus the repeater $$$) would go up.

It's all about the $$$$. That's the only reason that I can come up with for the high cost and the bizarre pass/fail percentage which seems to be a moving target. No other specialty which is as highly competitive as ophthalmology has a fail rate of 30%. None. Of course, one hopes that the other specialties' exams aren't as obscure. I can't even count how many times I heard that this is what you'll see in the bulk of your practice....and now this obscure bit, which you'll probably never ever see or manage unless its your specialty...and even then it will be rare.... will be the bulk of the WQE questions.

The WQE exam should be a comprehensive ophthalmology exam--which deals with straight forward items that the average comprehensive ophthalmologist would see. If you run into some obscure case, you're not treating the guy yourself anyways....he's being referred to a specialist, most likely at an academic center.
 
DiveMD said:
How realistic do you think these questions are in comparison to the boards?
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We strive to be as "realistic" to the "real thing" as possible. Of course, there is variability based on who actually wrote the question. As one of the editors, I hope to provide more consistency among the almost-3000 questions that we provide. It's somewhat of a tedious job, but it's been a rewarding experience thus far.

Of course, after everyone takes their OKAPs/WQE, we welcome any feedback (positive or negative) that could improve OQ as a resource.

We take feedback very seriously and provide what we think is excellent customer support. Point in fact: we have written well over 2,800 e-mails to our clients!

Best of luck to everyone.

-OQ
 
Doug F said:
Here is a great letter from an ophthalmologist to the American Board of Ophthalmology telling them how screwed up the WQE is in ABO:
http://www.parkavenuesafesight.com/PDF_Publications/openlettertoABO.pdf
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For all the flak that Emil Chynn takes here, this letter is full of completely valid arguments and suggestions for how to fix these issues. The ABO will likely need to either shape up in the future or risk hemorrhaging members. Look at Rand Paul's whole "National Ophthalmology Board" thing a few years back - there have been symptoms of problems with how the ABO goes about board certification for some time and from what I can tell no meaningful reform has has happened.
 
When I read the letter I too was amazed at how dead on it was. I must admit, I was SHOCKED when I saw who wrote it. There is no doubt that he is a genius even much to his own emotional upheaval.
 
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Also note that the letter is over 6 years old, and there have been no changes. There won't be any. The ABO makes a ton of money off of certification and recertification. They aren't going to let go of that. It's a joke, quite honestly.
 
Visionary said:
Also note that the letter is over 6 years old, and there have been no changes. There won't be any. The ABO makes a ton of money off of certification and recertification. They aren't going to let go of that. It's a joke, quite honestly.
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Hey, with the ACGME and AOA/AACOM merging to form a single GME system, maybe we fresh Ophthalmology residents will be eligible to sit for the D.O. Ophthalmology boards. Perhaps if enough people went the way of a different accreditation system they'd have a reason to enact some reform. Such is the problem with a monopoly. I know a lot of people think Rand Paul was a bit nuts with the whole "NOB" thing, but how else do you put pressure on an organization that has no other reason to change and a iron-clad guaranteed source of revenue. They could quadruple the price of the already incredibly expensive boards and you know what would happen? We'd all just have to pay it. It's a problem.
 
How were the boards today? Did that ophthoquestions website help you? I'm always curious what kids these days are using 🙂
 
LightBox said:
How were the boards today? Did that ophthoquestions website help you? I'm always curious what kids these days are using 🙂
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Kids these days... 🙂
 
ophthope said:
Hey, with the ACGME and AOA/AACOM merging to form a single GME system, maybe we fresh Ophthalmology residents will be eligible to sit for the D.O. Ophthalmology boards. Perhaps if enough people went the way of a different accreditation system they'd have a reason to enact some reform. Such is the problem with a monopoly. I know a lot of people think Rand Paul was a bit nuts with the whole "NOB" thing, but how else do you put pressure on an organization that has no other reason to change and a iron-clad guaranteed source of revenue. They could quadruple the price of the already incredibly expensive boards and you know what would happen? We'd all just have to pay it. It's a problem.
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You've hit the nail on the head.
 
I agree and it cannot be argued that the ABO which I presume is not-for-profit depends solely on the funding from people taking the boards. So, isn't it in their financial interest to fail as many people as possible? We are screwed because we don't have a choice? I think practically all of my friends failed the first time. Including me. It's funny that the people who actually passed the first time would always seek my advice first on any clinical problem they were facing. System is so unfair. I know about four ophthalmologists who are not boarded. I don't know if I passed or failed the other day but I am proud to say I am the only one in this group that has not totally given up.
 
How do the people who run the ABO get their positions? Are they elected for a limited amount of time before the next person takes over?

I think the best way to take care of this problem is to get a like-minded individual into the inner ranks of this absolutely worthless organization and gradually dismantle it from within.
 
That's crazy. This is not the Manchurian Candidate. And how do you suggest we do that? Rand Paul might be the way???
 
The written exam statistics from the past 5 years actually don't seem that unreasonable. Last year, over 90% of first-time takers passed the written exam. It appears that it's the repeat test takers who seem to fail repeatedly... with only 42% of them passing in 2013. They bring down the overall pass rate to 77%.

In 2012, 2011, 2010, and 2009, the pass rate for the first-time takers were 85%, 85%, 83%, and 88%, respectively, which sounds reasonable to me. 🙂

http://abop.org/about/examination-statistics/
 
Agree. But I think in prior years the rates were lower.
 
So what are people using these days to prepare for their boards?
 
Ophthoquestions.com is a really good study tool that simulates the format of the boards.
 
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