Residency program characteristics that are associated with pass rate of the American Board of Pediatrics certifying exam

BACKGROUND: The US is home to almost 200 pediatrics residency programs; despite this, there is little information about the relationship between program characteristics and performance in the American Board of Pediatrics (ABP) certifying exam. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the relationship between pass rate of the ABP certifying exam with the characteristics of categorical pediatrics residency programs. METHODS: This retrospective, cross-sectional study used publicly available data from the ABP website and the Fellowship and Residency Electronic Interactive Database. All programs that reported pass rates were included. The analysis, comprising univariate and multivariate linear regression, involved determining how 69 factors (eg, general information, number of faculty and trainees, work schedule, educational environment) related to the pass rate. RESULTS: Of 199 programs, 194 reported pass rates. The univariate analysis revealed 20 program characteristics with P-values <0.10. However, in the multivariate analysis, pass rate was significantly associated with only three program characteristics: ratio of full-time equivalent paid faculty to positions, percentage of US medical graduates, and average hours per week of regularly scheduled lectures or conferences. CONCLUSION: Unlike in previous studies, location and program size were not significantly associated with the pass rate in this multivariate analysis. The finding regarding the ratio of full-time equivalent paid faculty to positions highlighted the benefits of a well-supervised training environment, while that regarding the percentage of US medical graduates indicated the necessity of high competition in residency programs. Finally, longer hours per week of regularly scheduled lectures or conferences were associated with better academic outcomes, both statistically and intuitively.