How to pass the american board of orthopaedic surgery certifying examinations.

Abstract

Now that I have your attention, I would like to explain a few things about the American Board of Orthopaedic Surgery (ABOS) before getting into detail about the examinations themselves. The ABOS was started by a group of individuals representing the American Orthopaedic Association (AOA), the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS), and the Section of Orthopaedics of the American Medical Association (AMA). Their primary objective was to assure the public that the doctors caring for them were competent to do so. As the Board's Rules and Procedures state, [the ABOS] exists to serve the best interests of the public and of the medical profession by establishing educational standards for orthopaedic residents and by evaluating the initial and continuing qualifications and competence of orthopaedic surgeons. 1 Residents who are reading this may be curious about who determines what is taught during residency education. The Residency Review Committee for Orthopaedic Surgery of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), which performs on-site reviews of each residency education program in order to grant accreditation, may be familiar to some. The ACGME was created in the 1950s, but, prior to its formation, the ABOS made site visits to programs to determine whether they were adequately educating residents. The AMA, through its Graduate Medical Education Committee, reviewed the internships. The Residency Review Committee for Orthopaedic Surgery consists of appointees from the ABOS, the AMA Council for Graduate Medical Education, and the AAOS. In addition, there is also a resident member with full voting privileges. It may surprise some to know that the ABOS is a private, autonomous, voluntary, nonprofit organization. It has no allegiance to any specialty organization or to the AMA. The ABOS maintains its influence on orthopaedic residency education programs because it establishes the curriculum that it judges to be …