Board-to-board consistency in initial dental licensure examinations

The consistency between student clinical performance in dental school and performance on initial licensure examinations is known to be weak. A review of the literature failed to identify any reports of the consistency between performance on initial licensure examinations and quality of technical work in practice. This research examines the consistency of performance among candidates who took two initial licensure examinations given by different testing agencies but for the same jurisdiction within a few weeks of each other. Twenty-seven candidates from one dental school took both the California Dental Board examination and the Western Regional Examining Board initial licensure examinations in 2005 and 2006. Their performance on the patient-based amalgam and composite restorations and the root planing tests were compared in these two board settings and with various dental school measures of competence. Consistent with previous findings, school-to-board performance was barely above chance levels. Board-to-board association was also insignificant and accounted for 12 percent of the common variance in the best case. Patient-based initial licensure examinations have yet to demonstrate validity in terms of consistency of performance for candidates from one performance to the next.