There was a famous doc at Duke (Wm Stead, Internal Med) that was asked by the med school to become "certified" back when certification was getting started years ago. The story goes, "He gave it some thought. Then asked about the format, and told there would be a panel who ask some questions and he would answer. He thought some more. Then in all seriousness, asked, "Who is going to tell me I am wrong?" " -gb ----- Original Message ----- From: "Michael Sachs" <> To: <> Sent: Monday, February 04, 2002 3:02 AM Subject: Re: re-recertifying exam for the American Board of Pediatrics At 04:36 PM 2/3/02 -0600, Dogwood Ridge wrote: >Have you noticed that I've been posting more lately? Know why? I started my >computer guided recertification exam again and I am procrastinating. It seems >like yesterday that I did it, but the powers that be say another seven years >have gone by and it's my turn to do it again. And you know what else, the >questions seem harder this year. No, that's not true- it's just that the more >experience I have the more I seem to practice the "art of pediatrics" as >opposed to strictly the "science" of pediatrics and I can now think of more >exeptions to the answers. Sure, Alports is still the answer if someone tells >you the child has cataracts, hematuria, sensorineural hearing loss and a >family history of hematuria. But, some of the behavioral questions are not so >straight forward anymore. Since it is an open book test am I allowed to post >a question here? Has anybody else started theirs? Regards- Kim Burlingham, >MD rural peds, Winnsboro, TX Just finished the first component of this go-'round and sent it in last week. I agree with your feeling that some of the behavioral and other "less scientific" questions are ambiguous. I also consider specialist referrals in the same category as "books", and if the exam is open book then calling a subspecialist about a perplexing problem is no different than opening a book (and it's also what we do in the "real world"). There was one particular orthopedic question that had one possible answer that a pediatric orthopedist I spoke with had never even heard of. Guess what - the answer that he hadn't heard of was the correct one. How "real world" is that??? There was one child passenger safety question - I asked one of the foremost authorities in the COUNTRY for an opinion, and she couldn't figure out what answer they were looking for. This brings up one problem, as Gary pointed out: trying to figure out what the author of the question was looking for at the time the question was written, rather than trying to figure out what the correct answer probably is - in 2002. After 12 years of practice I did find that some of the "general" questions seemed easier than they did when I first recertified 6 years ago, but many of the "specialty" questions only brought back memories of topics I've barely dealt with since residency (Vit D/Calcium/Phosphorus metabolism anyone?). Thank goodness for Nelsons and Oski! BTW, I it seemed 6 years ago that the answers to many of the questions were taken almost verbatim from one of the standard textbooks. I didn't notice the same pattern this time. What I did do about half-way through the test was order the CD-ROM version of Nelsons (I might have ordered Oski, which I frequently like better, but the newest edition of Nelsons was published more recently). I finished the first component before the CD-ROM arrived, but I'm hoping it'll be easier to search the index and text using the CD-ROM rather than flipping through the hardcover version for the next two components. Michael Sachs, M.D. General Pediatrician