DOT physicals and certification exams

Only Certified Medical Examiners (CME) listed on the FMCSA National Registry can perform DOT physicals. It isn’t a courtesy you can extend to a patient with a CDL: an exam by a non-certified examiner produces an invalid certificate, which puts the driver’s livelihood at risk. Certification requires training and an exam, and it’s a reasonable thing to pursue if you have a lot of commercial drivers in your panel.

CMEs often do their work out of Urgent Care offices, and typically don’t have the patient’s medical records. They have the patients fill out forms about their medical issues. When appropriate, a CME may contact you for clarification about certain medical facts, such as a diabetic’s last a1c or are they on insulin; why they are on medications for ADHD. Of course, you can only reply with the patient’s written consent on our own “Authorization For Release of Health Information”.

The only testing that the DOT requires of drivers is a urine test to check for blood and glucose, so sometimes you will get back a patient who had an incidental finding of hematuria.