UPDATED: FMCSA’s Certified Medical Examiner website remains down

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners website has been down for nearly two weeks, and it remains unclear when the site will again be functional. The site allows commercial drivers to confirm which doctors are on the national registry to perform Department of Transportation physicals.

According to Mike Megehee, a doctor of chiropractic and president of Team CME, he started receiving calls about the site being down before 5 p.m. PST on Thursday, Nov. 30. As of Dec. 12, the site was still unavailable.

“The National Registry of Certified Medical Examiners website is currently down,” the website said. “FMCSA IT Support is aware of the issue and is working on a solution to remedy the situation. Once the site returns to service, a notification will be sent to all certified medical examiners. We suggest drivers and carriers continue to visit the site periodically to determine availability.”

For certified medical examiners, it means they have to wait to upload results of their DOT exams. Megehee said medical examiners have also been without the FMCSA’s page of frequently asked questions.

“We’ve had a lot of questions about why it’s down and how long it will be down,” Megehee said. “I haven’t been told why it’s down or how long. All I’ve been told is ‘soon.’”

On Dec. 13, the FMCSA added a message to certified medical examiners.

“Although the National Registry is currently not operational, certified medical examiners are able to continue conducting physical qualification examinations of CMV drivers,” the website said. “Medical examiners should hold all examinations completed during the outage and upload to the National Registry system when it is back online with no penalties.”

FMCSA said drivers should contact healthcare professionals directly to verify that they are certified and on the national registry until the website is working again.

In addition, truck drivers may use the OOIDA website to read reviews on certified medical examiners. OOIDA also provides information on how to properly prepare for a DOT physical.