The certification activity requirement includes earning a total of 50 certification points by completing ABFM Self-Assessment and Performance Improvement activities. Each certification activity is assigned a point value to help you track your progress toward completing your 50-point total requirement.
Designed to help family physicians identify gaps in knowledge through regular participation in self-assessment activities, this component enhances medical skills by reviewing the most up-to-date clinical content.
Requirement: Complete a minimum of one of the following Self-Assessment activities:
Please note that CME is not required as part of the Resident Certification Entry Process.
Learn more about available self-assessment activities below.
The Knowledge Self-Assessment activity is focused on evaluating and enhancing your knowledge base in a particular topic area common to family medicine. To successfully complete the assessment, you will need to answer 80% of the total questions correctly. After answering each question, you will be given a critique that explains why the answer you chose is correct or incorrect, a set of references, and the option to comment on the question. After you submit answers to all 60 questions, you will enter review mode where you will have the opportunity to submit new answers to questions marked incorrect until you receive a passing score.
This service provides convenient access to the latest peer-reviewed articles and the ability to earn valuable certification points and CME that contribute to your stage requirements. Available at no additional charge, National Journal Club features articles from numerous prominent medical journals. Choose from approximately 80 to 100 articles per year, which have been evaluated and ranked by a national committee of family medicine experts according to relevancy, methodological rigor, and impact on practice.
Select and read an article, reflect on what you read, and demonstrate mastery by correctly answering four assessment questions. There are unlimited opportunities to achieve a minimum passing score. Complete 10 article assessments to fulfill your Knowledge Self-Assessment requirement. If you have already completed your minimum certification activity requirement, you may still enjoy as many articles as you like.
The Continuous Knowledge Self-Assessment (CKSA) helps you identify knowledge gaps within the broad spectrum of family medicine. You will receive 25 questions per quarter through your MyABFM Portfolio or ABFM CKSA mobile app that can be completed whenever and wherever it is convenient for you.
After each question you will be given the correct answer, a critique that explains why other options were incorrect, a set of references, and the option to comment on the question. This information allows you to focus on subsequent CME in those areas.
Upon completion of 100 questions over four quarters, you will receive a performance report summarizing your results by the exam blueprint categories, establishing your probability of passing the exam, and analyzing how accurate your confidence was with regard to the correctness of your answer.
If you’re in need of additional points to complete your stage requirements, consider choosing an Alternative Activity. ABFM has partnered with many different organizations to offer a broad range of activities.
Alternative activities count toward your 50-point requirement; however, they do not fulfill the minimum Knowledge Self-Assessment requirement and may also include an additional cost to participate.
Designed to support high quality patient care, this component will help family physicians regularly identify an improvement opportunity or a performance gap, implement a change in care delivery, and measure the impact of that change to their patients or their practice.
Requirement: Earn 20 points by completing a minimum of one (1) Performance Improvement activity.
Select from a variety of ABFM-developed activities, or choose to design and report your own project through the Self-Directed Clinical activity. If your residency program participates in the Residency Performance Improvement Program (ResPIP) program, you may meet your requirement through this pathway.
Upon submission of a Performance Improvement activity, your work will be reviewed for meaningful participation. ABFM defines meaningful participation as identifying a gap in care or clinical processes, gathering baseline data for the chosen improvement measure, implementing an intervention to improve the chosen measure, and analyzing post-intervention data to assess the level of improvement.
Learn more about performance improvement activities ABFM offers below.
Self-Directed Performance Improvement activities allow an individual and up to 9 additional physicians to report customized clinical practice improvement efforts, regardless of the scope of care that is delivered. The application process has been streamlined (averaging ~20 minutes to complete) to require only the necessary information to demonstrate the improvement cycle, measure, intervention and re-measure, and attest to the level of participation in the effort.
ABFM has developed a broad range of activities based on topic areas to fit your practice setting that provide guidance for you to develop individual performance improvement interventions.
The Residency Performance Improvement Program (ResPIP) pathway is a means for residency programs to report successful completion of performance improvement group projects developed and overseen by the program which meet ABFM certification requirements.
Designed for organizations that support physicians in quality improvement efforts, or for clinical practices with more than 10 physicians, this pathway allows for approval for Organizational PI activities that will provide certification credit for any physician who is meaningfully participating, simply through attestation from the organizational sponsor.
ABFM has partnered with several external organizations to offer activities that satisfy your PI requirement such as American Academy of Family Physicians PI-CME, American Board of Pediatrics PIMS, University of Colorado TCPi, and more.
To view your outstanding requirements and choose an activity, log in to your MyABFM Portfolio now!
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