Historically, General Surgery has had one of the lowest—if not the lowest—exam pass rate of any area of medicine. It’s not abnormal for as many as 25% of the candidates to fail to pass the exam. According to a study published in the journal Archives of Surgery, residents that do not pass the qualifying and certifying exams for General Surgery are likely to have had a low score on the US Medical Licensing Examination Step 1 and to have had poor performance on the American Board of Surgery In-Training Examination (ABSITE). Therefore, these early tests are a good predictor of a candidate’s chances of passing the board exam.