The ACC has been approved as a Portfolio Program sponsor through the Multi-Specialty Portfolio Approval Program^™, a service provided by the American Board of Medical Specialties (ABMS). As a sponsor, the College can more easily support ongoing physician involvement in quality and/or process improvement activities and award Part IV credit for the American Board of Medical Specialties Program for Mainte¬nance of Certification (ABMS MOC^®).

“Achieving excellence as a provider of processes to maintain professional competency is one of the ACC’s top strategic priorities,” said ACC President Richard A. Chazal, MD, FACC. “As a Portfolio Program sponsor, the College can better achieve this goal and expand its reach in the quality and process improvement arena to a broader group of medical specialties that touch on the care of cardiovascular patients.”

Specifically, the ACC can deliver more meaningful and relevant quality and process improvement experiences to its members with dual board certifications (i.e. pediatrics and thoracic surgery), as well as its growing number of Affiliate members involved in areas like family medicine, radiology and emergency medicine. (See a complete list of boards that recognize ACC’s sponsor status).

Additionally, while the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) has suspended Part IV requirements under its MOC program as a result of feedback from the ACC and other internal medicine stakeholders, credit is still granted for practice improvement activities, and those physicians choosing to participate in the MOC program and subsequently Part IV activities can now experience a more streamlined and efficient credit-earning process. Like other ACC MOC offerings, all Part IV activities will be free to ACC members.

The Portfolio Program sponsor designation also positions the College as a trusted source of patient safety, patient voice and practice improvement activities for those members looking to maximize their efforts to meet Quality Payment Program requirements outlined under the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA). Physicians choosing to participate in the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) option under the Quality Payment Program must take part in clinical practice improvement activities ranging from offering expanded evening and weekend hours to participating in MOC Part IV. In short, physicians who elect to participate in MOC Part IV activities can get credit for certification and federal payment at the same time.