The American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS), the organization overseeing the certification of physician specialists in the US, has created a physician certification in two new subspecialties: Clinical Informatics and Brain Injury Medicine. The ABMS Board of Directors and Assembly Representatives approved the two subspecialties at their September 20-21 meetings. The American Board of Preventive Medicine (ABPM) and the American Board of Pathology (ABPath) will offer clinical Informatics. The American Board of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (ABPMR) and the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (ABPN) will offer brain Injury Medicine.
The goals of the Clinical Informatics subspecialty include establishing a standardized educational and certification process for physicians training in the complexities of the evolving field of clinical informatics, and enabling physicians who become Board Certified in this field to use their combined knowledge of patient care and informatics to support the transformation of health care from a low tech, paper-based system to one capable of tapping the power of computer-based systems to support all facets of health care delivery.
“The American Board of Preventive Medicine is delighted that Clinical Informatics was so enthusiastically supported by the other ABMS Boards,” said P. Glenn Merchant, MD, MPH, TM, ABPM’s Executive Director. “As important as certification in Clinical Informatics is, this approval allows us to begin working with the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) to create pathways to Clinical Informatics fellowships. It is those ACGME-accredited fellowships that will guarantee a steady stream of well-trained specialists, capable of helping to improve all aspects of health care delivery.”
Source: ABMS
