Physicians voted during the 2014 AMA Annual Meeting to continue investigating maintenance of certification (MOC), osteopathic continuous certification (OCC) and maintenance of licensure (MOL), including assessing the impact of MOC on physician practices.
The AMA House of Delegates adopted policy surrounding MOC, OCC and MOL that directs the AMA to:
- Explore the feasibility of conducting a study to evaluate the impact MOC requirements and MOL principles have on workforce, practice costs, patient outcomes, patient safety and patient access
- Work with the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS) and its member boards to collect data on why physicians choose to maintain or discontinue their board certification
- Work with the ABMS and the Federation of State Medical Boards to study whether MOC and the principles of MOL are important factors to physicians when deciding whether to retire and whether they have a direct impact on workforce
- Oppose making MOC mandatory as a condition of licensure
The policy will extend the AMA’s current work on MOC and MOL issues. Most recently, AMA feedback was incorporated into ABMS’ 2015 standards for MOC.
Just last week, the AMA and ABMS convened a meeting of physician assessment experts and academic medicine representatives to discuss the value of MOC Part III and innovative concepts that could potentially enhance or replace the current thinking around the secure exam requirement of MOC.
