Walking uphill both ways to school.

You don’t need a survey to tell you that taking board examinations are no fun, no matter the specialty branding. What’s unique to radiation oncology? Suffering the process 4x over on many subjects not formally taught or practiced day-to-day. This ARRO survey of 2019-2020 graduates quantifies the pain inflicted by incessant exams that, ironically, appear to confer a significant detriment on resident physician education. Over half of respondents used “research” or “elective” blocks for study time. And over half of those without protected study time used a median of one week’s vacation for study each year of exams—remember, that’s a third of standard annual allotted vacation. It’s no surprise then that, on a Likert-type scale, residents reported a moderately-negative impact on research productivity, clinical development, family life, and mental health. TBL: Look, board examinations are an important component of board certification, but maybe in the 2020s we can find a less resource-draining mechanism of ensuring the competency of rad onc constituents. | Campbell, Pract Radiat Oncol 2020