Dear fellow UAFP member:
As I reported in the most recent UAFP Magazine, the American Board of Family Medicine (ABFM) has entered a dynamic phase of transformation in support of excellence for our discipline. Right now, though, as family physicians across Utah are making enormous changes in practice to continue serving our patients during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, I would like to emphasize just two points:

1. ABFM is committed to ensuring that this crisis does not jeopardize your Board certification, and
2. You can be recognized with Practice Improvement credit for changes you are making in your practice in response to the pandemic.

Please see below the message from the Board for details, and contact me directly if you have any questions or suggestions. ABFM also has a COVID Update section on its website at www.theabfm.org/covid-19, where you can find all information about current and ongoing changes to certification deadlines and activities.

Michael K. Magill, M.D.
Professor and Chairman Emeritus
Chair-Elect, American Board of Family Medicine

The American Board of Family Medicine thanks all family physicians for their exceptional commitment to caring for their patients and their communities during the COVID-19 pandemic. We recognize that these are truly unprecedented times and want to do everything we can to allow you to focus on what is most important: your patients and your families. Our commitment is that no family physician will lose their ABFM certification because of the extraordinary patient care pressures associated with this pandemic.

Family physicians across the country are learning rapidly about COVID-19, applying what they learn to their practice setting, and adapting their approach to provide better care for patients at an unprecedented rate. ABFM will recognize you for these contributions in its continuing certification program. Additionally, if you are unable to participate in certification activities or Family Medicine Certification Longitudinal Assessment (FMCLA) in 2020 because of the demands of this pandemic, it will not jeopardize your certificate or your ability to continue your certification.

1. At this time, ABFM has made the following accommodations to the deadlines for your continuous certification participation:
   All diplomates with a three-year stage ending in 2020 will have a one-year extension on completing all stage requirements.
2. For diplomates participating in FMCLA, the Quarter 1 deadline has already been extended through June 15, 2020; we anticipate extending completion guidelines further for subsequent quarters. For first-year participants, we will adjust the meaningful participation guidelines.
3. Any diplomate in Year 10 of their certification cycle who opted for the one-day examination will have an additional year to meet their examination requirement.
4. Any board-eligible family physician with an eligibility end date in 2020, or anyone participating in the reentry process with an end date in 2020, will have an additional year to obtain their certification.
5. Any diplomate who also holds a Certificate of Added Qualification with an examination deadline in 2020 will have the option for an additional year to complete the examination requirement.
6. For those facing financial hardship as the result of the pandemic, we will establish a method for delaying 2020 payments. This change will take a short time to be implemented online, but once available, diplomates will find information about this in their Physician Portfolio, which can be found at https://portfolio.theabfm.org/

These extensions do not prevent anyone with a 2020 deadline from staying on the current timeline. Certification activities will be accessible for anyone who wants to use them. We are continuing our efforts to improve our current Knowledge Self-Assessments (KSA) and will begin to support learning on COVID-19 as evidence becomes more available. Specifically related to the Performance Improvement (PI) requirement, we will be providing a mechanism to meet the PI requirement by asking you to tell us about the unprecedented and rapid changes that you had to make in the ways that you deliver care, regardless of practice type or scope.

Further details will be communicated to those directly involved in the items listed above over the coming weeks. We are working out many operational details. It will take up to a month to reflect these changes in your Physician Portfolio, which you can find at https://portfolio.theabfm.org/. You can access updated information on our website at https://www.theabfm.org/covid-19. We are also committed to an ongoing review of what is happening as the pandemic evolves, and will adjust as necessary going forward.

We support you in the weeks and months ahead as you do the critical and challenging work required of this profession. It is nothing less than heroic.

Sincerely,
The American Board of Family Medicine