Some thoughts on the exam:
YAY! No ASOPs. A welcomed change after being 25% of last sitting’s points.
So much math compared to the last few sittings! I’m happy to have 25%ish math points replacing the ASOP points.
Timing didn’t seem to be as much of a struggle for me as it’s been in the past. I felt I gave much more elaborate answers this sitting than I typically do and still didn’t run into timing concerns. Did you all feel the same?
The propensity score question wasn’t too bad if you remembered the formula. Not sure how detailed you could get on the score interpretation, but only worth 1 point. And I think this problem in total wasn’t worth much.
Business risk was worth 3 points?! I definitely didn’t recall enough info to write for 9 minutes about that. The wording of the RBC math was obnoxious… I bet graders will see a variety of methods and answers.
The true/false opportunity analysis questions were pretty rough. I took the word-vomit-everything-I-could-recall approach to “justifying” my answers for those.
3 points for the ACO average per capita cost calculation seemed excessive. The actual formula for that seemed simple on the mate notecard but I still think I messed it up… I noted to only include part A and B claims, and include qualifying claims from all providers (i.e. don’t exclude providers who aren’t affiliated with the ACO) but no idea what the partial credit will look like. Still not worth 3 points IMO.
The last question about COVID from the new ORSA material felt open-ended for some of the parts… definitely the question I feel the worst about! 7 points.
All in all, I feel alright but also wouldn’t be surprised if I’m in the group who thinks a passing score is possible and then falls victim to the curve.
“All in all, I feel alright but also wouldn’t be surprised if I’m in the group who thinks a passing score is possible and then falls victim to the curve.”
Excluding the 2.5% on both extremes of the curve, I am pretty sure this is how the remaining 95% of the candidates feels about this exam.
If the SOA are fair (they are not), this sitting should have a 60-70% pass rate imo. This felt more like a college exam for which you can get a passing grade by studying the basics 1 or 2 weeks prior. There were very few spots where prepared candidates could make a difference.
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I want to play!
FALSE: RCT does not eliminate bias. Ex: Hawthorne effect
[assuming stmt said that RCT fully eliminates bias]
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I also felt good with timing.
For the ACO problem, I said the second member shouldn’t be included at all because only 20% of their costs were with an ACO physician. That’s my only variance from what you did – I wrote similar comments to you explaining the math in that problem.
Exactly the same thoughts for COVID. I couldn’t remember all of the lists in the SOA readings. I wrote comments based on work experience with that, but I always feel less confident in partial credit when I deviate from the lists.
Walked out saying “I think it must have gone okay if COVID was the part I felt worst about when I could base answers off of actual work experience.” I’ve never known how I should feel coming out of these exams, so I agree. It seems like I could have passed, but lots of confident people end up failing.
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2 of my friends were done with the exam after 1 hour and used the remaining hour to review their answers
Yeah, I excluded the one member where a majority of his claims where from a non-ACO provider since he would not be attributed to our ACO. I also noted to only include Medicare Part A/Part B services in the claim expenditures so ignored the drugs (saying I assumed they were all covered by Part D) and I think one other claim row for one member
And yeah for COVID risks, I wrote more based on feeling/my experience than remembering any specific lists outside of the 1st one where it mentioned specific UW concerns. That list I remembered existing even if I didn’t get all the correct responses from it
I was feeling pretty ok about my exam performance until I came on here and read through the discussion… trying to avoid taking PA so we’ll see what happens.
I also submitted the DMAC about a month prior to the exam, to try and make the August FAC (as the SOA indicated they would allow late registrants who received passing results from any other requirements the week of the deadline).
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Yeah, reading everyone’s comments online always makes me feel worse.
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Spring exams are up on the SOA website.
For question 3d where we’re asked to calculate the ACO’s average per capita cost, I’m thinking we didn’t need to exclude member 2 from the calculation. The problem states all three members are enrolled with the ACO, and the claims types don’t specify whether the care received from the physicians was “primary” or “specialist” care, so I don’t think there’s enough info to make that attribution determination without making some assumptions.
Judging from past SOA solutions, it’s very possible they did actually want us to make those assumptions lol
Yeah, I guess you could argue that by saying the person is a member of the ACO they were already attributed so you should have assumed that was correct and just had to remember that ACO is responsible for all care even at non-ACO physicians.
So in other words, you had to decide either 1 or 2 below
1)Argue that you get attributed to an ACO and since the % of care was out of ACO, the member shouldn’t count OR
2)the ACO is responsible for all care even from providers that aren’t part of the ACO and assume the attribution was correct
Excited for the “most candidate failed to remember that blah blah blah” with the opposite of what I decided
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I mean either way that question isn’t great. I think specialty spend can still count if no primary care was received so depends on what you assumed. Also they need to have at least 5,000 members so the per capita benchmark is meaningless but not sure if that’s what they were getting at.
I guess 4bii was True in the end, what did y’all think of the other TRUE/FALSE questions?
"(1 point) List the steps for implementing a care management program using the
opportunity analysis approach. "
Unfortunately I described the steps to design a program (analytics, assess the evidence, weight the economics) instead of budgeting and enroll care managers -_-
Entering the period of going back and forth between anticipating results because I feel good to dreading results because I’m worried I’m too confident
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Hopefully just an hour to go…
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I’m ready to stop thinking about this exam already
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Stopping in to drop the good vibes for you all!
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