While it's commonly interpreted that a low pass rate is akin to a high failure rate, this may not necessarily be true. If a graduate of a particular program decides to head into a Plastic Surgery residency or a Thoracic Surgery residency, where he would be able to sit for those board certification exams WITHOUT having to pass the General Surgery board exams, then that graduate would be counted as someone who DID NOT TAKE the exam and thus contributes to a lower pass rate. The same could be said for Vascular Surgery-bound General Surgery graduates as they are also not necessarily bound to pass the General Surgery board exams to sit for the Vascular Surgery boards nowadays.
I've seen this theory before, but is there any link where it can be confirmed? Do you
really believe that?
If that is the case, does somewhere like UTSW, where there's a 100% pass rate (or Harvard 95%, or Mayo 98%), make all residents sit for the boards? Surely, there are a large number of those residents from these prestigious programs going into fellowship.
As for my own program, there have been 34 graduates from 2002-2007. Eight went into fellowships where one would not typically sit for the GS boards (1 vascular, 1 CT, 6 plastics), while eight went into fellowship where one would sit for the boards (2 colorectal, 3 T/CC, 2 MI, 1 Transplant).
Now, 25 KU residents passed the QE on the first attempt for a 92%. That seems to me like the ABS only counted us for 27 people. 34-8=26, but also know that the CT guy is BC in General, so it's 34-7=27.
Now, I'll give you that the CE stats don't match up perfectly. (23 passed, 83% while 23/27=85%) And the QE/CE ratio is jacked up since it counts people who haven't taken the CE yet in the ratio.
Anyway, I believe that we got the 85% because 15% of us failed the exam, not because they went into fellowship and there's some fault in the ABS's calculations.
I also believe that programs that espouse your theory are making excuses. This isn't aimed directly at you, but rather at the programs I remember from the interview trail 3 years ago.
Sorry to include specifics from KU, but this is all info on our website and not secret, and I needed it to prove the point.
