How to Apply

1. Request an application and submit credentials: licensure, residency, fellowship or equivalent experience documentation.
2. Submit case logs meeting the Board's volume and breadth requirements; logs are subject to audit.
3. Credentials committee review and primary-source verification.
4. Sit the certifying examination on the published date.
5. Upon passing, certification is issued and the public verification record is created.

Three pathways to certification

Required of every applicant

• Current MD, DO, DDS or DMD licence, or a documented international equivalent.
• Core certification by the ABMS, AOA, RCPSC or ABOMS, or an equivalent international training certification.
• Proof of valid ACLS at the time of application.
• Affidavits covering years in practice and clear, unrestricted licensure.
• Verification of hospital operating-room privileges, an approved accredited facility, or a local-anaesthesia and oral-sedation note for special review.
• References from the chairperson of your residency or the department chief of your current hospital facility, an ABFCS diplomate, the director of your cosmetic surgery fellowship where applicable, and one or two practising physicians.
• AMA, AOA or FCVS physician profile, curriculum vitae, and two passport-type photographs.
• Application fee of $500, non-refundable, and the examination fee.

Experience Route

• 100 Category 1 CME credits in cosmetic surgery.
• A case log documenting a minimum of 200 major facial cosmetic procedures.
• 100 typed operative reports, 50 of them with numbered and correlated before-and-after photographs, originals, from the three years before the examination application.

AACS Certified Fellowship Route

• Verification of satisfactory completion of a facial, or approved general, cosmetic surgery fellowship from the AACS.
• A fellowship case log of at least 125 facial cosmetic procedures, noting the years and the fellowship type.
• Where that log falls short of 125 major facial procedures, 50 additional major facial cosmetic procedures as primary surgeon after the fellowship.
• 100 Category 1 CME credits in facial cosmetic surgery, required only where the fellowship was completed more than three years before the application.

Non-AACS Fellowship Route, in two tiers

• Tier One: a petition for equivalency fee of $450, non-refundable and in addition to the application fee.
• Tier One: a fellowship director letter attesting to the dates and training, or certification of the non-AACS fellowship, with a documented surgical log.
• Tier One: surgical operative logs from the fellowship training, which must meet AACS clinical fellowship guidelines for facial cosmetic surgery.
• Tier Two, which opens once Tier One is approved: 50 operative reports of major facial cosmetic cases with publication-quality before-and-after photographs, numbered and correlated.
• Tier Two: 100 Category 1 CME credits in facial cosmetic surgery, where the fellowship was completed more than three years before the application.