ABU certification/recertification by the numbers – slideshow

The Urology Times State of the Specialty survey seeks to identify the challenges, business-related practices, clinical trends, and demographic changes that are shaping the face of urology. For the 2014 edition of this report (the ninth such survey we’ve conducted thus far), we incorporated a series of questions about ABU certification and recertification, the responses to which are depicted here and in the slides that follow. Nearly all respondents indicated that they are certified by the American Board of Urology.

Nearly three-quarters of respondents have time-limited certificates.

Urology Times Clinical Practice Board member Henry Rosevear, MD, discusses his experience in taking the urology boards in this blog post.

More than three-quarters of respondents indicated that certification is required for their hospital privileges.

For more about the 2014 State of the Specialty report, click here.

Among urologists with a time-limited certificate, more than half said they plan to take the recertification exam at age 60 or over. However, as the next slide shows, this willingness to recertify at age 60 varies among age groups.

Younger urologists appear less inclined to recertify at 60 or older compared with their middle-aged and older colleagues.

Urologist Stephen G. Weiss, II, MD, recently relinquished his certification after being board-certified for nearly 15 years; read his letter to the ABU here.

Although government influence in medicine, declining practice reimbursement, and burnout top the factors influencing urologists’ decision to retire, nearly of a quarter of respondents also selected not wanting to take the recertification exam as another factor.

Following Dr. Weiss’ letter to the ABU and given the current controversy over maintenance of certification, Dr. Rosevear set out to learn the history of the ABU and MOC to better understand why the ABU finds it necessary to “jump through hoops.” Read more in Dr. Rosevear’s blog post.

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