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Critical Care Medicine Board Meeting Summary | Spring 2025

August 25, 2025  |  Posted by ABIM  |  Specialty Board Meeting Summaries

Laura E. Evans, MD, MSc, Chair, ABIM Critical Care Medicine Board

The Critical Care Medicine Board, which meets twice a year and is responsible for oversight of ABIM policy and assessment in the specialty, held its spring meeting on May 7, 2025. This meeting included a joint session with the Pulmonary Disease Board to discuss pertinent issues for both disciplines. Representatives from the American Association for Bronchology and Interventional Pulmonology (AABIP), the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN), the American College of Chest Physicians (CHEST), the American Thoracic Society (ATS), the Association of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Program Directors (APCCMPD) and the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM) joined for a portion of the joint session*.

The following is a summary of the spring meeting. Visit the ABIM Blog for reports of prior meetings. To share your feedback with the Critical Care Medicine Board on this report or other issues that are important to you, please complete this brief survey.

Contents:

Joint Session with the Pulmonary Disease Board

ABIM Leadership Update*

Furman S. McDonald, MD, MPH, President and Chief Executive Officer of ABIM and the ABIM Foundation, joined the Specialty Boards to share progress on key initiatives and ongoing areas of focus for ABIM, including:

  • Exploring the alignment of Maintenance of Certification (MOC) requirement due dates with the Longitudinal Knowledge Assessment (LKA®) cycle to help make the MOC program more reliably predictable.
  • Enhancements made to the LKA in response to feedback from physicians who identified areas for improvement, which are intended to keep the program relevant and effective.
  • Expanding ABIM’s engagement with stakeholder communities such as early career physicians, specialty societies and patient-focused organizations.
  • Upgrades to the ABIM website and Physician Portal for 2025 designed to make it easier for both physicians and the public to find information.

The group discussed how to better engage early career physicians through stronger partnerships with medical societies, noting the societies’ role in education and staying current. The relationship between ABIM and societies was seen as an area of continued importance. Dr. McDonald also mentioned ongoing collaboration with other ABMS Member Boards to slow the spread of medical misinformation and address other challenges to the medical community. He affirmed ABIM’s commitment to evidence-based medicine and working with societies to defend scientific standards.

Some members of the group also inquired about AI’s role in training and assessment. Dr. McDonald explained how ABIM monitors the impact of AI on assessment and how new technologies can be used to enhance staff processes.

Specialty Boards Oversight of Assessment*

Each spring, the ABIM Specialty Boards review data related to certification and assessment trends in their disciplines to help guide their decisions on assessments. At this meeting, the Critical Care Medicine and Pulmonary Disease Boards received statistics on the current state of active certification in their disciplines, assessment enrollment, demographics and pass rates, and data from post-assessment surveys. (Some data, such as exam pass rates and resident and fellow workforce trends, are publicly available on ABIM’s website.)

Of note: 22,886 physicians have been ABIM Board Certified in Pulmonary Disease since it was first offered in 1941 with 17,776 currently holding a valid certificate. 21,232 have been ABIM Board Certified in Critical Care Medicine since it was first offered in 1987 with 14,869 currently holding a valid certificate. There is an overlap of 12,236 physicians who maintain both certifications. Within the specialty of Critical Care Medicine, Critical Care Medicine and Pulmonary Disease share the greatest overlap of board-certified physicians, followed by Sleep Medicine with 2,062 maintaining all three certifications. There is also a small overlap (124) with Hospice and Palliative Medicine, Critical Care Medicine and Pulmonary Disease. Physicians certified in critical care medicine also maintain certifications in cardiovascular disease, nephrology and infectious disease in small numbers.

The LKA continues to be the leading choice. Of physicians due for an assessment in 2024 who chose to take one, 73% chose the Pulmonary Disease LKA and 69% chose the Critical Care Medicine LKA (ABIM Board Certified). In addition, 99% of cosponsored critical care medicine physicians are taking the LKA, i.e., physicians who qualified for certification in critical care medicine through another ABMS Member Board such as the American Board of Emergency Medicine.

A chief topic of discussion was how physicians maintaining multiple certifications manage the LKA, which provides 30 questions each quarter in each discipline for a five-year cycle. Some Specialty Board members raised concerns over the ability of physicians to manage answering 60 or 90 questions each quarter if they maintain multiple certifications. The idea of reducing question loads for dual- or triple-boarded physicians has come up before and ABIM is still exploring whether this is possible to do while upholding the security and fairness of the assessment. Some in the group suggested using AI tools or adaptive testing, but they agreed on the need for more data overall related to practice settings and trends in how physicians choose assessment options, including whether they drop out of the LKA and register for the traditional exam over time.

Initial Certification and Training Data in Critical Care Medicine and Pulmonary Disease*

The Specialty Boards also reviewed new data from the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP), Board Eligibility data, outcomes for candidates requiring retraining, faculty pathway pass rates and approved Advancing Innovation in Residency Education (AIRE) programs in their specialties. Erica N. Johnson, MD, FACP, FIDSA, Senior Vice President for Academic and Medical Affairs for ABIM, also explained more about the special consideration pathways available for physicians with different training backgrounds offering alternative routes to Board Eligibility. ABIM expects to announce a new pilot pathway later this summer 2025 for “exceptionally qualified” international medical graduates who received medical education or training outside of the United States but who complete an ACGME-accredited fellowship. ABMS reviewed and approved the pilot in June.

Initial Certification Procedures*

The Pulmonary Disease Board and Critical Care Medicine Board are in the process of determining which procedures should be required to qualify for initial certification in the two specialties following fellowship, and whether any changes are needed. This is a standard review process that ABIM facilitates in each discipline on a rolling basis. They discussed the need for each Specialty Board to be responsible for making recommendations separately and agreed to institute working groups comprising Specialty Board and Approval Committee members to help define standards before opening a public comment period. They also discussed how program directors can be invited to contribute feedback about overlapping areas of training; program directors are routinely included in procedural requirement review processes.

More information will be forthcoming. Once draft recommendations have been made, ABIM will invite the physician community to provide input for the Specialty Boards to consider before making final decisions about training requirements for fellows. There would be at least one year between the Specialty Boards’ decisions and the requirements becoming effective for fellows entering pulmonary/critical care medicine fellowship.

Supporting Research and Important Issues in the Disciplines*

Dr. Johnson led the Specialty Boards in a discussion about opportunities for ABIM Governance members to support important issues and research that demonstrates the value of board certification. Dr. Johnson asked the Specialty Boards to identify current or emerging issues that affect health care in critical care medicine and pulmonary disease, and to consider opportunities for the Specialty Boards to address these issues within the appropriate framework of their oversight of the disciplines.

Colleen Connor, a patient member on the Pulmonary Disease Board living with pulmonary hypertension and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Pulmonary Hypertension Association (PHA), spoke about efforts to improve access for people who need oxygen. She explained increased access challenges for patients who rely on liquid oxygen, which limits their independence. She stressed the need to spread the awareness to healthcare centers and physicians as more patients need this support, and shared information about the SOAR Act of 2024, a proposed law that would address this issue.

The Pulmonary Disease Board departed at this point in the meeting.
What follows is a summary of the remainder of the Critical Care Medicine Board’s meeting.

Critical Care Medicine Board Meeting

Innovations in Assessment*

ABIM’s Research and Innovations Department has been leading a program of research on improving assessments through three main areas: supporting the efficiency of assessment staff, facilitating the item development process and enhancing the assessment experience for physicians. The Critical Care Medicine Board received an overview of the team’s current projects and inquired further about the use of AI tools in assessment, specifically about how examinees use AI as a resource and how AI might be useful in cross-checking and reducing redundancies in assessment development. They also discussed the importance of comparing AI-generated content with human-generated content. All ABIM assessments are still created by human physicians and test experts.

Jerome Clauser, Ph.D., Senior Director, Research and Innovations for ABIM, explained that AI use is permitted on the “open book” LKA but examinees are advised that they must not copy and paste assessment content. ABIM also uses a secure licensed program to monitor AI use and to help ensure the integrity of assessment questions.

Annual Diplomate Report*

ABIM is looking into the potential for publishing annual reports of data that will highlight broad statistics across each discipline of internal medicine, both for a given year and historic trends over time. This would include the current number of physicians certified in each discipline and its geographic distribution, participation rates in MOC, demographic characteristics and assessment performance. While some of these data have been made available on request for research purposes, ABIM has never published a consolidated annual report. One Specialty Board member noted the proportion of male to female physicians who certify in critical care medicine (68 – 79% male between 2001 and the present) and asked whether that ratio persists throughout MOC. Lorna Lynn, MD, Vice President of Medical Assessment Engagement, explained the more complex trends related to MOC going back to 1987 when the certification was first offered.

Diplomate Professional Profile*

The Diplomate Professional Profile is a questionnaire built into the ABIM Physician Portal and required of all ABIM Board Certified physicians every five years. The questionnaire gathers information about clinical work and practice patterns, and ABIM uses the information to help update exam blueprints, develop policies for initial certification and MOC, and ensure adequate representation of physician experiences in research. To date, 44% of physicians have completed the Diplomate Professional Profile, with a rate of 53% in critical care medicine specialists. Siddharta G. Reddy, MPH, Senior Research Associate for ABIM, reviewed some of the aggregate data gathered so far related to critical care medicine, including practice setting, practice size and physician ownership of practices. Of note, 91% of critical care medicine respondents reported being clinically active with their practice type split between hospital inpatient (36.5%), academic faculty (31.8%), hospital- or system-owned (26.4%) and private practice (23.3%). Most practice structures were reported as multi-specialty group practice (48.7%) and hospital- or health system-owned (46.4%).

Dr. Evans noted that it might be worthwhile to explore possible connections between practice settings and physician burnout in a collaborative research project.

Community Practice in ABIM Governance*

Dr. Johnson led a discussion with the Critical Care Medicine Board on community practice in the specialty to create a more inclusive understanding of its role and scope. She also sought input on overlapping aspects of community practice across the disciplines of internal medicine to inform ABIM’s recruitment efforts for broad physician representation in governance roles.

Since 2013, ABIM Specialty Boards have been required to include at least one physician member primarily engaged in community practice, defined broadly in applications as “clinical practice in a non-university, community setting.” A workgroup convened in 2020 found that the existing practice categories candidates could choose were inadequate to the real scope of community practice and proposed updates drawn from the American Medical Association and the Diplomate Professional Profile.

Discussion centered on the complex nature of practice settings and how physicians define their roles. Many physicians within critical care and other specialties, operate across hybrid or overlapping environments—academic, community, telehealth, etc.—and the role of intensivist further complicates the question for critical care. The group agreed that they needed more detailed data, such as what might be generated through the Diplomate Professional Profile, to better inform decisions around governance representation across all disciplines. Dr. Evans also emphasized the need to be inclusive and in touch with the range of experiences and needs of the whole physician community.

Blueprint Review Tool*

Eddie Smith, Exam Developer for ABIM, demonstrated the Blueprint Review Tool that ABIM is using for a current job analysis of the field which will eventually update the Critical Care Medicine Blueprints for initial certification and MOC. The Blueprint Review Tool is both an internal application for ABIM staff and a platform for physicians to rate each section of the existing blueprint and provide comments on what, if anything, should be changed to reflect current realities of practice in the specialty, particularly how much of their clinical time is spent on a given topic area and how important the specific area is to practice. Physicians certified in the specialty receive an email invitation to participate in one or more sections of the blueprint. The tool also includes the capability to pause, save and come back later when time is limited. ABIM conducted the blueprint review survey data in critical care medicine (among others) up until June 23, when the response period closed in order for staff to analyze survey data. Physicians were invited to respond to changes to the blueprint proposed by the Approval Committees and Specialty Board. The feedback from the survey will inform the final blueprint, which is expected to be published in January.

Society representatives departed at this point in the meeting.

Candidates for the Critical Care Medicine Approval Committees

ABIM Specialty Boards are responsible for selecting members and chairs of the Approval Committees annually and as needed. At the spring meeting, the Critical Care Medicine Board reviewed candidate materials and voted to approve the following appointment:

  • Paul A. Bergl, MD, FACP, of ThedaCare Regional Medical Centers to join the Critical Care Medicine LKA Approval Committee
  • Taro Minami, MD, of the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University to join the Critical Care Medicine Traditional, 10-Year MOC Exam Approval Committee
  • Jennifer Svetlecic, MD, of St. Luke’s Health System in Kansas City, Missouri, to join the Critical Care Medicine Traditional, 10-Year MOC Exam Approval Committee

Visit ABIM’s website for a full list of current openings.
Approval Committee openings are usually posted in the fall.

Updates from the Critical Care Medicine Approval Committees

Gina Iacovella, MD, Chair of the Critical Care Medicine LKA Approval Committee, and Ryan Maves, MD, FCCM, FCCP, FIDSA, Chair of the Critical Care Medicine Traditional, 10-Year MOC Exam Approval Committee, provided a written report of recent meetings and the member composition of the Approval Committees, rates at which items are approved for use on assessments and goals for item development with the Item-Writing Task Force. The report noted the work that went into the proposed revisions to the Critical Care Medicine Blueprints as well as the Item-Writing Task Force’s outstanding success of exceeding goals for developing new questions.

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*Indicates that society representatives were present for discussion of this agenda topic.

ABIM governance, Critical Care Medicine, Critical Care Medicine Board, Laura Evans, Summary Report

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