How to Prepare for the Occupational Medicine Recertification Exam
Occupational medical practitioners with time-limited certificates must be recertified every 10 years by the American Board of Preventative Medicine (ABPM). Time-limited certificates were awarded beginning in 1998. Recertification can only be obtained by completing the four components of the Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program, the third of which is completion of an exam. Practitioners can sit for this exam seven years after first obtaining certification. The exam consists of 100 multiple choice questions.
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Instructions
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Identify the next MOC exam dates. Exams are offered during the meetings of the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (ACOEM), the American College of Preventative Medicine (ACPM) and the Aerospace Medical Association (AsMA). The dates for these meetings and, therefore, also the examinations are listed on the MOC website.
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2
Register for the next exam. If you were certified for seven years, you are eligible to sit for the MOC recertification exam. Complete registration online at the MOC website.
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3
Sign up for an exam review course. The ACPM offers a review course for the MOC exam, with information listed beneath the testing dates on the MOC website. This review course is one day long, but may not be located in your city.
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4
Study independently six weeks before the exam. Regardless of whether or not you are attending the review course, you must study independently for the exam. The day-long multiple choice exam is broken into two parts. The morning portion tests on preventative medicine and the afternoon portion tests on occupational medicine. The exam includes identifying chemical, physical and psychological hazards, discussing how to control hazardous factors and describing how to treat environmental and occupational diseases. Information about the contents of the exam can be found on the ACOEM website.
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Test your knowledge. The best way to prepare for a certification exam is to test how well you remember what you have studied. Create flashcards or take multiple choice exams provided by a review course to identify areas you should study more and those areas which you fully understand. Time your test-taking so it is the same amount of time you will have during the actual recertification exam.
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Review your studies two days prior to the exam. The last two days prior to the exam should be spent reviewing your knowledge. The most strenuous studying you should engage in at this time should be taking practice tests.
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References
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