ABIM Signals Move Away From 10-Year MOC Exam
ACG’s Efforts Paying Off, Much More Work Remains
ACG is fighting for you to reduce the burden of Maintenance of Certification (MOC) for GI physicians. Working on your behalf, ACG has advocated at ABIM against life-long testing and urged them to embrace strategies in support of life-long learning.
ABIM’s announcement yesterday of their “goal of moving away from the mandatory 10-year MOC exam for diplomates” signals an important course correction. ACG’s efforts are clearly paying off, but much more work remains to turn this around.
You will have heard from ABIM by email about their Blueprint Review process and their call to “Help Make ABIM’s MOC Exam More Reflective of Today’s Practice.” The College urges you to participate in the review and provide direct feedback and perspective to the ABIM to ensure that GI physicians’ voices are heard in this process. The ACG leadership consulted with the College’s Educational Affairs Committee and the sense of the group is that participating in this effort provides the best chance to alter the MOC assessment to be more relevant to GI clinicians.
The College will continue to push ABIM to fundamentally re-envision the MOC process. Our efforts for you continue to be guided by ACG’s Core Principles:
- MOC needs to be simpler, less intrusive and less expensive
- We support ending the high-stakes, every 10-year exam
- We do not support closed book assessments as they do not represent the current realities of medicine in the digital age
- We support the principles of lifelong learning as evidenced by ongoing CME activities, rather than lifelong testing
- We support the concept that, for the many diplomates who specialize within certain areas of gastroenterology and hepatology, MOC should not need to include high-stakes assessments of areas in which the diplomate may not practice