It is ABIM's policy to comply with Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). ABIM will offer its examinations in a place and manner accessible to persons with qualifying disabilities or offer alternative accessible arrangements for such individuals, where feasible. In addition, ABIM will make reasonable modifications, upon request, to its examination procedures or provide auxiliary aides or services for candidates with documented disabilities, provided that the change does not fundamentally alter the measurement of the skills or knowledge being assessed and that it is not unduly burdensome. Please note that there are specific registration deadlines for requesting a modification to allow for the creation of special exam formats. For additional information about the process and documentation requirements, as well as deadlines and confidentiality, please refer to this section or contact ABIM at accommodations@abim.org.
Consistent with the ADA, ABIM will:
- Offer its examinations in a place and manner accessible to persons with disabilities or offer alternative accessible arrangements for such individuals, where feasible.
- Make reasonable modifications, upon request, to its examination procedures or provide auxiliary aides or services for candidates with documented disabilities.
- Evaluate each request for an accommodation and any information submitted in support of such request.
Why are accommodations made?
Accommodations are made in order to ensure that examination results reflect each candidate's clinical knowledge or medical judgment, rather than the candidate's sensory, manual or psychological skills, except where those skills are factors that a given examination is designed to measure.
ABIM will consider requests for all forms of accommodation, but based on ABIM's experience, these requests are more likely to be evaluated quickly:
- A request that includes all suggested pieces of Disability Documentation
- A request for one of the Common Testing Accommodations
To qualify for a testing accommodation under the ADA, you must demonstrate that you have a qualifying disability that necessitates the provision of a testing accommodation.
A disability is defined by the ADA as a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities, as compared to most people in the general population.
Confidentiality policy:
In all cases, ABIM prefers to communicate directly with candidates who request accommodations.
When necessity requires, however, ABIM will communicate with a delegate of a candidate regarding ABIM policy and the status of that candidate's request for accommodations. In such circumstances, candidates themselves must affirmatively state their intention to communicate through a specific delegate to ABIM.
In all cases, communication between ABIM and a candidate's delegate will not include the sharing of confidential medical information.