Basic questions on Board Exams

[zut212]

I visited http://www.abpsus.org - which is the American Board of Physician Specialties.

I also tried to understand this aspect of a physician's training a little better by reading about it on Wikipedia. Here are my basic questions:

1. About 93% of medical students pass the USMLE I. What percentage of physicians pass the boards? I realize that this value is very different for all the different specialties.
2. When I visited http://www.abpsus.org/, on the right side, it says: "Physicians like you choose ABPS" . My question is: Physicians choose ABPS as opposed to what?
3. Why does an MD (or DO) take the ABPS?
4. What are the ramifications if they pass or fail?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[alwaysaangel]

I visited http://www.abpsus.org - which is the American Board of Physician Specialties.

I also tried to understand this aspect of a physician's training a little better by reading about it on Wikipedia. Here are my basic questions:

1. About 93% of medical students pass the USMLE I. What percentage of physicians pass the boards? I realize that this value is very different for all the different specialties.
2. When I visited http://www.abpsus.org/, on the right side, it says: "Physicians like you choose ABPS" . My question is: Physicians choose ABPS as opposed to what?
3. Why does an MD (or DO) take the ABPS?
4. What are the ramifications if they pass or fail?

1) Varies by specialty and program. Some are actually pretty dismal. When a friend of mine was looking at peds programs some only had a 50% pass rate on their first try. All physicians will eventually pass if they want to practice in that specialty. The rate of passing depends on the specialty and the program. FREIDA may have more info on that.
2) Being board licensed in a particular specialty is so common nowadays people are forgetting the old alternative. A "General Practitioner" was a physician who just completed an intern year and practiced general medicine. No specialty, no board certification. Its almost impossible to be covered by malpractice like that now so no one does it.

The banner you are specifically referring to is talking about EM physicians it looks like. That is a still a particularly big controversy as EM is a relatively new field. Prior to that any one in any specialty would work in Emergency departments. Now it is considered a separate specialty and there is a huge push (especially by EM Boarded physicians) for ONLY board certified emergency medicine doctors to work in emergency departments as they feel they are the best trained.

3) You take the boards to become board certified in your field of choice. You retake them several times throughout your career (depending on your specialty) to remain board certified.

This proves you are well enough trained in that field and will increase your job opportunities and decrease your malpractice costs.

Almost no one goes without board certification now.

4) If you fail you retake it. If you fail again, you retake it again. If you keep failing....I guess you find an urgent care that will hire you? Just makes it very hard to find a job/malpractice as you are not technically certified in your specialty.

 

[KeyzerSoze]

1) Varies by specialty and program. Some are actually pretty dismal. When a friend of mine was looking at peds programs some only had a 50% pass rate on their first try. All physicians will eventually pass if they want to practice in that specialty. The rate of passing depends on the specialty and the program. FREIDA may have more info on that.
2) Being board licensed in a particular specialty is so common nowadays people are forgetting the old alternative. A "General Practitioner" was a physician who just completed an intern year and practiced general medicine. No specialty, no board certification. Its almost impossible to be covered by malpractice like that now so no one does it.

The banner you are specifically referring to is talking about EM physicians it looks like. That is a still a particularly big controversy as EM is a relatively new field. Prior to that any one in any specialty would work in Emergency departments. Now it is considered a separate specialty and there is a huge push (especially by EM Boarded physicians) for ONLY board certified emergency medicine doctors to work in emergency departments as they feel they are the best trained.

3) You take the boards to become board certified in your field of choice. You retake them several times throughout your career (depending on your specialty) to remain board certified.

This proves you are well enough trained in that field and will increase your job opportunities and decrease your malpractice costs.

Almost no one goes without board certification now.

4) If you fail you retake it. If you fail again, you retake it again. If you keep failing....I guess you find an urgent care that will hire you? Just makes it very hard to find a job/malpractice as you are not technically certified in your specialty.

Are you sure you're not conflating two issues here? As you say, it's very rare for physicians to practice after a year (or two, in some states) of internship but no complete residency. But plenty of doctors complete their residency and practice in that field without taking the boards for their specialty. When you see lists of doctors (like on insurance company websites) a lot will be board certified but quite a few just say that they are "board eligible", which I always understood to mean that they've finished the residency but haven't taken the specialty boards.

 

[alwaysaangel]

Are you sure you're not conflating two issues here? As you say, it's very rare for physicians to practice after a year (or two, in some states) of internship but no complete residency. But plenty of doctors complete their residency and practice in that field without taking the boards for their specialty. When you see lists of doctors (like on insurance company websites) a lot will be board certified but quite a few just say that they are "board eligible", which I always understood to mean that they've finished the residency but haven't taken the specialty boards.

To be honest its possible. If someone knows different please correct me. Most of my information comes from the specialty I will be goign into (EM) and for them being fully certified is a very big deal.

 

[LRAccord624]

A hospital I volunteered at would sometimes hire new physicians who were board eligible, but they gave them a certain amount of time in which they had to pass their boards. If they hadn't passed by the allotted time, their contract was subject to suspension or termination. I'm guessing this clause goes into a lot of contracts of "board eligible" physicians.