Pass Rates on the American Board of Family Medicine Certification Exam by Residency Location and Size

Falcone, John L.; Middleton, Donald B.

doi:10.3122/jabfm.2013.04.120307

Cited by 14 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Unfortunately, neither factor is directly related to the characteristics of a residency program, because the former is an important predictor of individual performance whereas the latter is a regulatory factor. Some evidence suggests that location and program size are associated with the pass rate of the American Board of Family Medicine (ABFM) ( 15 ) and American Board of Pediatrics (ABP) certifying exams ( 16 ). Moreover, recent studies have shown that the pass rate of the ABFM certifying exam was also associated with accreditation cycle length, opportunities for international experiences, and training in alternative medicine ( 17 ).…”

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confidence: 99%

Relationship of residency program characteristics with pass rate of the American Board of Internal Medicine certifying exam

Atsawarungruangkit

2015

Medical Education Online

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Objectives: To evaluate the relationship between the pass rate of the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) certifying exam and the characteristics of residency programs. Methods: The study used a retrospective, cross-sectional design with publicly available data from the ABIM and the Fellowship and Residency Electronic Interactive Database. All categorical residency programs with reported pass rates were included. Using univariate and multivariate, linear regression analyses, I analyzed how 69 factors (e.g., location, general information, number of faculty and trainees, work schedule, educational environment) are related to the pass rate. Results: Of 371 programs, only one region had a significantly different pass rate from the other regions; however, as no other characteristics were reported in this region, I excluded program location from further analysis. In the multivariate analysis, pass rate was significantly associated with four program characteristics: ratio of full-time equivalent paid faculty to positions, percentage of osteopathic doctors, formal mentoring program, and on-site child care (OCC). Numerous factors were not associated at all, including minimum exam scores, salary, vacation days, and average hours per week. Conclusions: As shown through the ratio of full-time equivalent paid faculty to positions and whether there was a formal mentoring program, a highly supervised training experience was strongly associated with the pass rate. In contrast, percentage of osteopathic doctors was inversely related to the pass rate. Programs with OCC significantly outperformed programs without OCC. This study suggested that enhancing supervision of training programs and offering parental support may help attract and produce competitive residents.

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Relationship of residency program characteristics with pass rate of the American Board of Internal Medicine certifying exam

Atsawarungruangkit

2015

Medical Education Online

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“…Moreover, IM programs in this region had the highest average pass rate of the American Board of Internal Medicine [10]. Besides IM, both pediatric and family medicine residencies also witnessed outstanding performance in program board exams in this region [7,8]. In general, training programs, including gastroenterology fellowship programs, located in the Pacific region are very competitive compared to those in other regions.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Depending on the study design and types of residency programs considered, program characteristics that affect the pass rate of a board exam include: program size [6–9], location [7–9], accreditation cycle length [9], opportunities for international experiences [9], training in alternative medicine [9], ratio of full-time equivalent paid faculty to fellowship positions (FTP) [10–12], proportion of trainees based on type of medical school [10,11], formal mentoring program [10], on-site child care [10], and average hours per week of regularly scheduled lectures or conferences [11]. A thorough literature search shows no similar studies in medical subspecialties, which may be a consequence of pass rates for subspecialty levels being unavailable.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Association between proportion of US medical graduates and program characteristics in gastroenterology fellowships

Atsawarungruangkit

2017

Medical Education Online

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Background: Gastroenterology is one of the most competitive internal medicine fellowship. However, factors that associated with program competitiveness have not been documented. Objective: The objective of this study was to evaluate associations between characteristics of gastroenterology fellowship programs and their competitiveness through the proportion of US medical graduates for the academic year 2016/17. Design: This study used a retrospective, cross-sectional design with data obtained from the American Medical Association. The proportion of US medical graduates in gastroenterology fellowships was used as an indicator of program competitiveness. Using both univariate and multivariate linear regression analyses, we analyzed the association between the proportion of medical graduates in each program and 27 program characteristics based on a significance level of 0.05. Results: In total, 153 out of 171 gastroenterology fellowship programs satisfied the inclusion criteria. A multivariate analysis revealed that a higher proportion of US medical graduates was significantly associated with five program characteristics: that it was a university-based program (p < 0.001), the ratio of full-time paid faculty to fellow positions (p < 0.001), the proportion of females in the program (p = 0.002), location in the Pacific region (p = 0.039), and a non-smoker hiring policy (p = 0.042). Conclusions: Among the five significant factors, being university based, located in the Pacific, and having a non-smoker hiring policy were likely to remain unchanged over a long period. However, program directors and candidates should pay attention to equivalence between full-time paid faculty and fellowship positions, and the proportion of women in the program. The former indicates the level of supervision while the latter has become increasingly important owing to the higher proportion of women in medicine.

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“…Finally, in a fascinating study and a call for action, Falcone et al 17 report publically available data on the average examination scores on the American Board of Family Medicine certification examination. They found that many US family medicine residency programs have low average examination scores and high failure rates among their graduates that do not meet the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education recommendations.…”

Section: New Clinical Information and Reviewsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Common Illnesses, Patient Physician Interactions, Continuity, and Practice Organization

Bowman¹,

Neale²

2013

The Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine

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As our readership continues to expand dramatically, we are pleased to have an issue with broad range of articles all about common issues or illnesses seen daily, providing much information that will inform patient care and aid the practice of medicine. Included are articles addressing the effect of shared decision making about PSA testing and weight loss management, capitated payments to patient education, physician language related to adherence, and various factors of provider-patient continuity. We also have articles comparing outcomes of Cesarean sections by family physicians and obstetricians, articles about the natural history of symptoms (dangerous or otherwise) in childhood febrile illnesses, and articles providing a different look at sample medications, the evolving use of narcotics for chronic pain, a risk estimation score for male osteoporosis, a simple test for detecting cognitive impairment in people with low literacy, reproductive health care for adolescent women, and the overlap syndrome between asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. In addition, we note that scores on the Practice Organization and ManagementPearson et al 1 report that high-but not moderate-levels of capitation were associated with much higher rates of providing patient education, which can benefit patient outcomes. By looking at the factors associated with such continuity, Saultz et al 2 provide valuable details extending typically expected results (such as the frequency of being in the office) to other specific results that could help offices improve their patient-provider continuity in the ambulatory care office setting. For example, the authors assess continuity by numbers of patients compared with session frequency, and the comparisons extend to associated mid-level providers. Our interest in outcomes extends to the maternity care of women, and Johnson et al 3 found similar outcomes in a comparison of 2 different rural hospitals respectively staffed for Cesarean sections by family physicians and obstetrics. While there are many factors that could account for this, particularly the limited sample size, this finding is still reassuring. Of course, it does seem that adequate training and ongoing experience should lead to similar outcomes. From the Netherlands, Huibers et al 4 followed up with patients who had spoken with an advice nurse by phone after office hours. Of interest for readers from the United States, the advice nurses had a physician in the call center about half of the time. In general, the telephone calls were not appreciated as much as home visits or in-office consultations after hours. About half of patients had follow-up visits, and although the calls were positively rated, those who did not have a follow-up visit were more likely to rate the telephone call highly. Brown et al 5 provide greater evidence on the lack of medical usefulness of medications typically found in sample closets. In their detailed analysis, a generic drug for the same indications as almost all the sample closet medications was a...

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Pass Rates on the American Board of Family Medicine Certification Exam by Residency Location and Size

Cited by 14 publications

References 9 publications

Relationship of residency program characteristics with pass rate of the American Board of Internal Medicine certifying exam

Relationship of residency program characteristics with pass rate of the American Board of Internal Medicine certifying exam

Association between proportion of US medical graduates and program characteristics in gastroenterology fellowships

Common Illnesses, Patient Physician Interactions, Continuity, and Practice Organization

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