Failure on a Vascular Surgery Board-American Board of Surgery Examination does not predict cardiovascular outcomes in the Society for Vascular Surgery Vascular Quality Initiative

Objective: The Vascular Surgery Board of the American Board of Surgery (VSB-ABS) Qualifying and Certifying examinations are meant to assess qualifications to independently practice vascular surgery, but it is unclear whether examination performance correlates with clinical outcomes. We assessed this relationship using clinical outcomes data for VSB-ABS diplomates from the Society for Vascular Surgery Vascular Quality Initiative (SVS-VQI). Methods: VSB-ABS examination performance for vascular surgeons participating in the SVS-VQI registry was characterized according to pass/fail status. Surgical experience was measured by number of years since completion of training. Examination performance and experience were compared with a composite clinical outcome (in-patient major adverse cardiac events or postoperative death [MACE+POD]) after arterial reconstructions (carotid stenting or endarterectomy, aortic aneurysm repair, open peripheral surgical bypasses) registered in the SVS-VQI. Multivariate mixed effects regression was performed adjusting for sex and surgery type, as well as clustering by surgeon and by hospital. Results: From 2003 to 2017, complete data were available for 776 vascular surgeons who performed 124,171 arterial reconstructions (carotid n = 56,650; aortic n = 34,764; peripheral n = 32,757) registered in the SVS-VQI. Patient characteristics associated with higher odds of MACE+POD were female sex (odds ratio [OR] 1.07; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.03-1.12; P = .006) and advancing age (OR, 1.04; 95% CI, 1.03-1.04; P < .001). Of the 776 surgeons, 149 (17%) had failed at least one VSB-ABS examination (group F). The unadjusted primary composite outcome of MACE+POD was marginally higher after operations performed by surgeons who never failed an examination (group P; 7% vs 6%; P = .03). This difference seems to be driven by higher rates of postoperative congestive heart failure in the aortic and lower extremity bypass cohorts as well as more postoperative myocardial infarctions after lower extremity bypass by group P surgeons. Following multivariable analyses, examination pass status was not associated with MACE+POD (OR, 0.98; 95% CI, 0.89-1.50; P = .517). However, increasing surgical experience correlated with significantly lower odds of MACE+POD (2% lower odds/year of experience since training [OR, 0.98; 95% CI, 0.98-0.99; P < .001]). Conclusions: VSB-ABS examination performance by SVS-VQI surgeons does not correlate with registry-reported mortality or cardiovascular complications. Increasing surgical experience is strongly associated with lower odds of cardiovascular morbidity and death.