When Will ABIM Debate?

Paul Kempen, MD, PhD comments on Medical Economics article, “MOC changes aim to lessen burden on physicians, but debate continues” :

I continue to be astounded that the ABIM refuses to openly debate the topic in an open forum. The Benjamin Rush Society invited the ABIM and ABMS to debate MOC in their home town of Philadelphia last April-they failed to come (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AetMD0OYVkY). The ABIM does NOT want to debate the issues openly in a neutral forum because the whole extortion process is unwanted by physicians in General, and it provides no index of quality. The ABIM and ABMS are trying to introduce these changes under the radar through the gradual program of lobby congress and hide from Open discussion. MOC is simply a money making extortion program self-serving to the certification industry. The ABIM itself concluded as early as 1986 and themselves published in 2000 the fact that voluntary MOC would not be possible (ANN INT MED 2000; 133:202-08 . THAT is why they imposed it with artificially restricting the certification to 10 then 8 and now to Continuous subscriptions to MOC to maintain a certificate that they themselves deem to be “VOLUNTARY”.