On July 15, the American Board of Family Medicine (ABFM) announced that board-certified family physicians who are currently certified and have their 10-year examination requirement due before Wednesday, December 31, 2020, will have the option to participate in the Family Medicine Certification Longitudinal Assessment (FMCLA) in 2020.
In December 2018, the ABFM launched the FMCLA pilot to study the feasibility and validity of an alternative to the one-day family medicine certification examination. This approach to assessment of cognitive expertise is more aligned with adult learning principles, promoting more enduring learning, retention, and transfer of knowledge than infrequent, episodic examinations.
In 2019, the pilot was initially limited to Diplomates whose current certification was due to end on Tuesday, December 31, 2019. The feedback in the first year of the pilot has been tremendously positive and the delivery platform and other early metrics are functioning well. The ABFM continues to be in a pilot period through the end of 2020, so the same process and rules will apply for this group as did for the 2019 cohort.
For more information, visit the ABFM website.
At the end of two years, the ABFM hopes to have sufficient information to analyze the performance of the FMCLA and determine if it can be deployed long-term as an option for how Diplomates take their examination in the future.