I’m due to do my recertification via examination soon for the Certified Geriatric Pharmacist credential. As I was looking on the CCGP website to reapply, I checked out their recent news. I was surprised to find out that Board of Pharmacy Specialties (BPS) is acquiring the CGP credential. You can read the whole press release here.
If are a CGP or are seeking CGP certification, how will this affect you? A few thoughts…
- This will make things more simple. Having all pharmacist board certifications under one roof (BPS) does make some sense. I had always wondered why BPS did not pursue a geriatric certification, but with the existence of the CGP, it made sense that they left it alone.
- I suspect the CGP exam will get more difficult under BPS. With passing rates for BCPS and BCACP historically between 60-70%, I think CGP (or likely to be called BCGP) will get more challenging and likely incorporate more regulatory and statistics type questions similar to BCPS and BCACP. I wouldn’t anticipate any changes in the next year or two, but you never know. I was never able to find pass rates for CGP exam test takers, but certainly feel like CGP was easier than BCPS.
- Testing window. One of the things I do like about the CGP exam is wide range of testing windows that is allowed. There are four different testing windows throughout the year. I suspect this will change to two like the other BPS exams. The other thing that could happen is that the BPS folks will expand to four testing windows. More options are better in my opinion.
- The credential will likely change from CGP to BCGP (Board Certified Geriatric Pharmacist). When this is exactly going to happen and when that process is rolled out is unclear.
- Certification timeframe. CGP is currently due every 5 years. I would anticipate that while under the BPS umbrella, this will change to every 7 years. Again, how and when this change takes place remains to be seen. At least I haven’t seen anything formal at this point.
Like it or not, pharmacist board certification is not going away and the number of certified pharmacists continues to grow at a very fast pace. Overall I believe this change is more of a good thing than a bad thing. What do you think?
You can find more information about board exam study materials here.
I was planning on doing both CGP and BCPS next year but now that may affect me keeping two certification active if you have to do those monthly PSAP books! It would be nice if they started combining these things such as BCPS with specialist in geriatrics or something like that! These days employers go crazy over certifications! Seems the more you have the more they like lol! I know some people maintain two BCPS certifications but it can be costly they say! I just bought you study guide for the CGP too!
I have both BCPS and CGP. For this situation (like yours Eric), It will be cheaper to maintain as we only have to pay dues to one organization now (dues is not x2 for 2 credentials). We will probably have more CE to do if the CE requirements are more, we will have to renew less times since 5 years will likely go to 7 years. The certification exam will probably be more similar to BCPS which I found was harder with a lot more stats compared to CGP. Recognition of what CGP is about will likely go up as “BCGP” will fit the lettering convention of the more widely known BCPS, and practitioners will have a better idea of what it means. Costs may go up if they prefer PSAP forms for geriatrics though. And recently the PSAP for the whole year was $90, then change to 2 books (half the content each) but the price didnt drop by half it stayed at $90 for both books now, so essentially the CE cost per unit doubled!!!!