Surgical Resident Accuracy in Predicting Their ABSITE Score

BACKGROUND: The American Board of Surgery In-Training Examination (ABSITE) is given to all surgical residents as an assessment tool for residents and their programs in preparation for the American Board of Surgery qualifying and certifying examinations. Our objective was to ascertain how well surgical residents could predict their percentile score on the ABSITE using two predictor measures before and one immediately after the examination was completed. METHODS: A survey was given to surgical residents in postgraduate year(s) (PGY) 2 through 5 as well as to research residents in November and December 2011, and immediately after the examination in January 2012, to ascertain their predicted ABSITE scores. Thirty-one general surgery residents were measured consisting of PGY-2 (22%), PGY-3 (19.4%), PGY-4 (19.4%), and PGY-5 (12.9%), and research residents 25.8%. RESULTS: Mean prediction scores were consistently higher than actual examination scores for both junior and senior examination takers, with senior examination predictions exhibiting the highest proportion of variation on the actual examination score. Stratified linear regression analysis showed little predictive significance of all 3 examination predictions and actual score, except for the senior examination predictions in November 2011 (t test = 2.521, P = .027). We found no statistically significant difference in the proportion of residents overestimating or underestimating their predicted score. Secondary analysis using a linear regression model shows that 2011 scores were a statistically significant predictor of 2012 scores (overall F = 13.258, P = .001, R(2) = 0.31) for both junior and senior examinations. CONCLUSION: General surgery residents were not able to accurately predict their ABSITE score; however, the previous year's actual scores were found to have the most predictive value of the next year's actual scores.