Well first, if you have only seen the Em vid, you have to see
this one... genius.
...but it's not an ideal system, no.
It (ABFAS) is also a system that's pretty hard and does not discriminate. A lot of people study hard, some fail, a lot have to retry.
ABPM just passes everyone and doesn't eval cases (trusts our crummy residencies to have done that). So, they're both flawed... yeah.
But that doesn't change the fact that ABFAS is useful and ABPM is something bogus that everyone has (or has better).
But the advice to anyone remains the same:
don't do anything that'll limit yourself from things you want (or may want) to do.
I don't think anyone would tell a resident "sure, you'll be fine with ABPM." No way... that's a lie. If they try ABFAS and don't pass with best effort, then that's another story.
...Podiatry is
mega-saturated. Fellowships fad and the Linkedin peacocking and even the VA or podunk hospital jobs being competitive now prove this 100x over. Jobs are competitive and getting moreso (but it only takes one good one to make someone's ROI go from 3:1 to maybe 1:1). There is such a huge difference in having a hospital pod or good pay job... versus working a typical pod associate or supergroup job. Again, it only takes one.
There is obviously no list of hospitals that will take ABPM for hiring or for OR privi or etc. There's no list of groups that'll throw away non-ABFAS applications (I've been denied interview for not having ABFAS, and we all have... whether we know it or not). Things can change
even once on staff or hired at a hospital that'll allow ABPM today. Bylaws may change if they have issues with DPM surgery or one who understands our boards gets hired or just gets on the med staff and/or has input on bylaws. Most quality facilities and groups/hospitals know what ABFAS is... so it's shortsighted not to try for it (assuming you want to do surgery... it's the appropriate board).
There is just no situation where having ABFAS qual or cert hurts a DPM... and there are many where it helps them.
Nobody would even say studying for ABFAS hurts anyone, so yeah... it's the recommendation to try for it.