Increasing evidence of widespread cheating and
fraud involving the basic examinations that doctors
must pass before they are allowed to practice medicine is being reported by medical educators, state and Federal officials and professional groups.
In the last several years, all or parts of three of the four key tests involved in the process leading to the licensing of physicians have been stolen, reproduced and sold for prices as high as $50,000 a copy, the officials say. Nearly 100,000 students and doctors take the tests each year, and while officials say they cannot give an exact estimate of the number who cheat and they assume that the vast majority of those taking the tests are honest, they say cheating has become a significant and growing problem. ''The fraud relating to the tests is shocking,'' said Janet Carson, general counsel of the National Board of Medical Examiners, the professional organization in Philadelphia that drafts most of the tests. ''It's illegal and immoral and undermines everyone's faith in the medical profession.''
The evidence of cheating on medical licensing examinations, along with the continuing investigations of hundreds of doctors found to have purchased fraudulent or altered medical school transcripts, adds to the growing alarm that current state and Federal regulatory efforts are inadequate to guarantee that all doctors practicing medicine are qualified to do so.
Some of the people questioned in the investigations of altered or phony medical school diplomas also have said that illicit copies of the official tests are openly for sale on the street. These include the ''Flex'' tests of the Federation of State Licensing Examiners, which most states require before a doctor can practice medicine there; the test of the Educational Commission on Foreign Medical Graduates, known as E.C.F.M.G., which is given to foreign-trained doctors who want to practice in the United States; the Medical College Aptitude Tests, taken each year by 50,000 students seeking admission to medical school, and the National Boards, a variety of tests of medical knowledge devised by the National Board of Medical Examiners to certify specialists.
''There is no question that the problem of cheating is becoming more serious,'' said Dr. John A. D. Cooper, president of the Association of American Medical Col leges. Dr. Cooper said cheating had also spilled over into areas of ''forged college transcripts and forged letters of recommendation'' used to support applications to medical schools.
State officials say that cheating - in some cases the theft of the actual tests - has been confirmed in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maine, Michigan, Louisiana and California. Because the tests are often distributed across the country, however, the officials suspect cheating and fraud is more widespread.
Extensive Inquiry by F.B.I.
Paul Miller, a special agent in the Philadelphia office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, said agents there have been coordinating ''an extensive national investigation'' into the theft, reproduction and sale of medical testing documents. ''We have focused our efforts on New York City, several other areas of the United States, and two areas overseas, one of them in the Caribbean,'' Mr. Miller said.
Among the activities being investigated are violations of the copyright law, the theft and interstate transportation of copyrighted material, and wire fraud, which Mr. Miller described as the use of telephones for the transmission of stolen tests among groups in different states.
The agents believe that several groups of people, acting independently, are responsible for the thefts, rather than one large national ring, he said.
One group being investigated in Brooklyn is suspected of stealing, reproducing and selling parts of the medical licensing tests on a nationwide basis.
Last year, the F.B.I. arrested three doctors in New Jersey on charges of offering a $7,000 bribe to an employee of the National Board of Medical Examiners in return for a copy of a test. Two of the three men, Dr. Frank Fashina and Dr. Abdoul Edward Komeh, were convicted of bribery and fined last year. The third, Dr. Rolando Natividad, has fled the country, according to F.B.I.
'Greed, Pure and Simple'