Relationship between outcome of written and clinical parts in internal medicine board certifying examination.

Objective: To assess the correlation between written and clinical scores of the Thai Board of Internal Medicine certification examination in different academic years. Methods: Data from 585 internal medicine residents who passed both written and clinical parts of the board certifying examination in the first attempt during the academic year 2005-2007 were collected. Correlation between scores from both parts in each year were then examined. Results: Modest positive linear correlation was found between the written and clinical examination scores in overall (r = 0.57, 0.55, and 0.38, p < 0.001 in 2005-7 respectively). When considered for the subpart of clinical examination scores, the correlation with the section of laboratory interpretation was highest (r = 0.52, 0.54, and 0.33, p < 0.001 in 2005-7 respectively). Conclusion: The outcome of written and clinical parts of certification examination for Thai Board of Internal Medicine had a modest relationship.