Building Priorities in Health & Health Care into ABFM’s Knowledge Assessments

In January 2021, the Board of Directors of the American Board of Family Medicine (ABFM) decided that emerging priorities in health and health care should become an explicit component of knowledge assessment in the future. ABFM examinations and self-assessment activities are comprised of a balance of items representing the competencies within family medicine. The composition of these self-assessments and the examinations is guided by a “blueprint” that reflects current knowledge expected of every family physician regarding diagnosis and treatment in daily practice. These items are written and reviewed by volunteer family physicians who practice in a wide variety of settings across the country; the topics come from their clinical practice along with recent evidence and practice guidelines. The Board is now adding a new explicit and proactive process to ensure that broad trends impacting the clinical practices of family physicians are reflected in the certification examination. It is not enough for family physicians to have knowledge to practice today. As the largest and most widely distributed group of primary care physicians, and as leaders in responding to emerging health problems, family physicians must address future challenges in practice. Mastery of the specific clinical knowledge will be an important foundation of that work. In this editorial, we describe the process, review the topics chosen, and describe the implications for Diplomates.