New Comprehensive Subject Examination Score Reports Align with USMLE

The comprehensive subject examinations, including the Comprehensive Basic Science Examination (CBSE) and Comprehensive Clinical Science Examination (CCSE), began using new score scales and score feedback reports that align with the redesigned format for the United States Medical Licensing Examination® (USMLE®) score report on August 5.

“The new comprehensive subject examination score scales and score reports provide medical school students with the information that will help students gauge their readiness for USMLE and facilitate correct score inferences,” said Carol Morrison, a Principle Psychometrician at NBME.

During the initial work on the redesign of the USMLE score reports, which the new comprehensive subject examination score reports mirror, NBME staff addressed feedback from examinees and medical schools and aimed to provide more useful information in a way that was user-friendly. In response to that feedback, some of the key features of the new comprehensive subject examination reports show:

• An examinee’s performance compared with recent first-time takers from US and Canadian medical schools
• Performance in individual content areas relative to overall examination performance
• Information regarding the allocation of items across content area

The score feedback reports for the remainder of the subject examinations are now available with an updated and modernized format. These score reports have only minor formatting changes but no content changes at this time.

NBME staff are conducting informational webinars for medical school faculty to learn more and ask questions about the new score scales and score reports in August and September.

In addition to the webinars, for more information regarding the new comprehensive subject examination score report or any other subject examination score feedback, please contact the NBME subject examination team at  subjectexams@nbme.org.