FMCSA certified medical examiner website still down

December 22, 2017

Land Line Staff

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With Christmas approaching, the FMCSA’s National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners website still wasn’t operational.

The website, which allows commercial drivers to confirm which doctors are on the national registry to perform Department of Transportation physicals, originally went down on Nov. 30 and didn’t resume its functionality until Dec. 14. However, the site stopped working again on the afternoon of Dec. 15 and still wasn’t working as of Friday, Dec. 22.

“The National Registry is currently unavailable,” the site stated. “We are working to restore services.”

FMCSA’s instructions
While the site isn’t working, it does provide separate instructions for drivers, motor carriers, state driver’s license agencies, certified medical examiners, and test centers.

The FMCSA said drivers, who are preparing to have a DOT physical, should verify that the doctor is still on the registry.

“We suggest that you contact your healthcare professional directly to verify if they are certified and listed on the national registry. Each certified medical examiner on the national registry is provided a certificate from FMCSA confirming their approval to conduct DOT examinations. This certificate can be used to determine if the individual conducting your exam is approved to do so.”

FMCSA’s other instructions:

  • Motor carriers and state driver’s license agencies: We suggest you hold medical examiner’s certificates that need to be verified until the website is once again operational.
  • Certified medical examiners: CMEs are able to continue conducting physical qualification examinations of CMV drivers and issuing paper medical examiner’s certificate, Form MCSA-5876, to qualified drivers. Medical examiners should segregate all examinations completed during the outage and be prepared to upload them to the national registry system when it is back online with no penalties. All CMEs will be notified by the FMCSA once the system is available.
  • Test centers: We suggest you hold all the test results that need to be transmitted until the system is once again operational.

The FMCSA has continued to decline providing any explanation on what has caused the outages.

The functionality of the site will become even more important in June when the process will change from a driver receiving a medical card from the examiner after passing the exam to where the information will be submitted electronically to the FMCSA and then to the state licensing agency. The final rule takes effect June 22.

OOIDA website offers medical examiner reviews
Truck drivers, who are preparing for a DOT exam, can use the OOIDA website to read reviews on certified medical examiners. Drivers should contact healthcare professionals directly to verify that they certified and on the national registry until the FMCSA website is working again.