Spring Certification Exam

• 1/23/23 - First Deadline for Application
• 3/20/23 - Deadline for Selection of Testing Date and Location
• Exam Dates - April 11-15, April 17-21, April 24-28 
• 6/16/23 - Examination Results

Fall Certification Exam

• 8/21/23 - First Deadline for Application
• 10/23/23 - Deadline for Selection of Testing Date and Location
• Exam Dates - November 6-11
• 12/29/23 - Examination Results

The One-Day Family Medicine Certification Examination is divided into four separate sections of equal length and 100 minutes of pooled break time is available to be used between sections.  Each of the four sections includes 75 questions, and is timed at 95 minutes.

ABFM Certification Examination Content

Cardiovascular 12%

Endocrine 8%

Gastrointestinal 7%

Hematologic/Immune 3%

Integumentary 6%

Musculoskeletal 12%

Nephrologic 3%

Neurologic 3%

Nonspecific 9%

Psychogenic 7%

Reproductive—Female 4%

Reproductive—Male 1%

Respiratory 13%

Special Sensory 2%

Population-based Care 5%
This includes topics such as biostatistics and epidemiology, evidence-based medicine, prevention, health policy and legal issues, bioterror, quality improvement, and geographic/urban/rural issues.

Patient-based Systems 5%
This includes topics such as clinical decision-making, communication and doctor-patient interaction, family and cultural issues, ethics, palliative care, and end-of-life care.

The exam is pass-fail, although there is a scaled rank score that goes from 200 to 800.  Pass rates in Family Medicine have improved significantly since the 2010’s, with changes to Maintenance of Certification methodologies.

Most of the applications for specialty certification from the ABFM are from initial first-time test takers.  Most of these are from residents in the United States, though international first-time applicants score almost identically.  

Overall, pass rates for certification and recertification are swayed somewhat by repeat test takers.  For instance, in attempts to recertify, the success rate in 2022 was only 79% in first time recertification attempts, and the success rate was 32.4% for repeat recertification attempts.

By the numbers, 

2018 - Initial Exam - United States Only 98.7%
International 97.3%

2019 - Initial Exam -  United States Only 98.6%
International 98.5%

2020 - Initial Exam -  United States Only 98.3%
International 98.1%

2021 - Initial Exam - United States Only 98.6%
International 98.5%

2022 - Initial Exam - United States Only 98.2%
International 98.2%

If this is your first time taking the ABFM certification, and you are in an FM residency, and you passed your ITEs, then the odds of failing the exam are very low.  Question bank reviews before the exam are still recommended.

If you are recertifying after some time out of the specialty, and have not had recent exams, then serious study before the exam with a current Q&A resource is going to be very, very important to you.