This study plan must demonstrate your learning strategy, time limit, and specific content area so that you can concentrate on the points that are really important for the exam.

In this article, we will tell you how you can establish your ASCP microbiology study plan and make it successful.

Understanding the ASCP Microbiology Exam

The ASCP Board of Certification (BOC) conducts its exams, including the M/SM exams, around the world every year.

To go for the M ASCP technologists in microbiology or SM ASCP specialists in microbiology exam, you must understand its exam format.

Both of these exams are composed of 100 multiple-choice questions that you have to finish in 2 hours and 30 minutes.

These exams are designed using the format of CAT (computer adaptive testing): a computer that is packed with a series of easy and difficult questions.

If you answer the question correctly, your upcoming questions will be slightly more difficult than the previous ones, but if you answer the question incorrectly, your next question will be a little easier than the first one.

You cannot skip any questions in CAT format; for every question that will appear on your computer screen, you have to answer.

Introduction of ASCP Microbiology Certification

The ASCP BOC presents two certifications for the microbiology field.

M ASCP: Design for microbiology technologists
SM ASCP: Design for microbiology specialists

Both of these certificates are also for international candidates.

M ASCPi: ASCP international microbiology technologist
SM ASCPi: ASCP international microbiology specialist

For all these ASCP microbiology certifications, the board suggests separate eligibility routes.

The application fee is also different for all these ASCP M/SM and ASCPi M/SM certifications.

Application fee for all ASCP microbiology certifications:

M ASCP (U.S. technologist): $250
SM ASCP (U.S. specialist): $300
M ASCPi (International technologist): $210
SM ASCPi (International specialist): $260

Eligibility Criteria for ASCP Microbiology Exam

The ASCP Board of Certification (BOC) fixes ASCP microbiology certification requirements. To satisfy at least one route requirement, it is vital to apply for the M/SM exam.

ASCP Microbiology Requirement for Technologists

M ASCP

Route 1: ASCP medical laboratory scientist certification and a baccalaureate degree from an approved institution.
Route 2: Bachelor’s degree in biological science or chemistry Or Baccalaureate degree with the combination of 30 semester hours in chemistry or biology, and microbiology clinical experience of one year.
Route 3: Baccalaureate degree in chemistry or biological science or bachelor’s degree with the combination of 30 semester hours chemistry and biology, microbiology structured program by NAACLS approved medical lab scientist program.
Route 4: Microbiology clinical experience of six months and master’s degree from an approved institution.
Route 5: Baccalaureate degree in medical lab science, OR bachelor’s degree with the combination of 30 semester hours in chemistry or biology and medical lab scientist program by NAACLS.

M ASCPi

Route 1: ASCP international medical laboratory scientist certification and a baccalaureate degree.
Route 2: Microbiology clinical experience (one year) and bachelor’s degree in chemistry or biological science OR baccalaureate with the combination of 30 semester hrs in chemistry or biology.
Route 3: Baccalaureate degree in chemistry or biological science or bachelor’s degree with the combination of 30 semester hours in chemistry and biology & microbiology clinical training program.
Route 4: Microbiology clinical experience of 6 months and master’s degree from an authorized institution.
Route 5: medical lab training program and bachelor’s degree in medical lab science.

ASCP Microbiology Certification Requirement for Specialist

SM ASCP

R0ute 1: M ASCP or MLS ASCP credential, baccalaureate degree, and microbiology clinical experience of three years.
R0ute 2: Clinical experience in microbiology (must be three years) and a master’s degree in biology, chemistry, medical lab science, or another related field.
R0ute 3: Doctorate in microbiology, allied health, medical laboratory science, or an appropriately related field, and clinical microbiology post-doctoral fellowship (this fellowship must be two years)
Route 4: M (ASCP) or MLS ASCP credentials, a doctorate in microbiology, chemistry, or another related field, one year of clinical experience in microbiology, OR research experience in microbiology (1 year).
Route 5: ASCP M/MLS credential, three years of clinical microbiology experience as an academic educator, and bachelor’ degree.
R0ute 6: ASCP microbiology or ASCP medical lab scientist certification, a doctorate in biology, chemistry, or other relevant fields, and as an academic educator, one year of experience in clinical microbiology.

SM ASCPi

Route 1: M ASCP/ASCPi or MLS ASCP/ASCPi credential, baccalaureate degree, and microbiology clinical experience (three years).
R0ute 2: Microbiology clinical experience (must be three years) and a master’s degree in biology, medical lab science, chemistry, or another related field.
Route 3: Microbiology two years of clinical experience and doctorate in microbiology, chemistry, medical lab science, or another related field.
R0ute 4: M (ASCP/ASCPi) or MLS (ASCP/ASCPi) credentials, a doctorate in immunology, microbiology, chemistry, or in relevant field, clinical expertise in microbiology (one year), OR research experience in microbiology (1 year).
R0ute 5: ASCP/ASCPi M/MLS credential, clinical microbiology experience (three years) as an academic educator and bachelor’ degree.
R0ute 6: ASCP/ASCPi microbiology or ASCP/ASCPi medical lab scientist certification, as an academic educator, one year of experience in clinical microbiology, and a doctorate in chemistry, biology, or other relevant fields. .

Exam Overview and Content Area

The American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP) Board of Certification (BOC) determines four subjects for ASCP microbiology exam preparation.

Getting knowledge from all these content areas is essential because the board picks different percentages of exam questions from each subject.

The following are the question percentages from each subject that the ASCP BOC recommended:

Analytic Procedures for Virology, Mycology, Mycobacteriology, and Parasitology: 20-30% for M ASCP but 30-40% for SM ASCP
Preanalytical Procedures: 10-15% for M ASCP but 5-10% for SM ASCP
Laboratory Operation:10-15% for M ASCP but 20-25% for SM ASCP
Analytical Procedures for Bacteriology: 45-55% for M ASCP but 30-40% for SM ASCP

With question percentage, the ASCP BOC also determines the major exam content outline for ASCP microbiology certification preparation.

These outlines are given below:

Preanalytic Procedures

Stains (Methodology, interpretation, & rules)
Sample transport
Sample collection

Analytical Procedures for Bacteriology

Identification methods
Organism pathogenicity
Colony morphology
BSL-3 pathogens & select agents
Antimicrobial susceptibility testing
Normal flora
MRSA/MSSA, ESBL/CRE, VRE screening
Specimen sources
Antibiotic resistance
Agents of infection
Correlation with other lab results

Analytic Procedures for Mycobacteriology, Virology, Mycology, and Parasitology

Antimicrobial/antiviral/antifungal susceptibility testing (only for SM ASCP)
Identification procedures
Major pathogens
Specimen sources
Disease states
Serological testing procedures

Laboratory Operation

Postanalytic procedures
Safety
Laboratory Mathematics
Instrumentation
Administration (only for SM ASCP)
Troubleshooting/quality assessment

Creating an Effective ASCP Microbiology Study Plan

If you start your study by establishing an effective ASCP microbiology study plan, you can manage all the work on time.

To keep balance in your practice and study, you must divide your time and work into manageable chunks.

To create an effective study plan, you must follow the following strategies:

Consider your Time

Before establishing the ASCP microbiology course, you must consider the time that you can allocate for your M/SM exam preparation.

For better preparation, you must allocate 5 hours per day to finish the overall syllabus before the final day.

Understand the Exam Content Area with Questions Percentage

All the exam content areas are crucial regarding exam preparation.

But you must fix a little more time for a higher percentage of content (Analytic Procedure of Bacteriology: 45-55%) than a low percentage exam content area (Preanalytical Procedure: 10-15%).

Get Advice from Seniors

If you feel that your ASCP microbiology study plan is not working for you, you must get advice from experts.

Make sure to know the effective and ineffective strategies that they have applied during their ASCP microbiology certification journey.

For this, you should join the “ASCP Certification Prep” Facebook group, where you can interact with ASCP-certified experts.

Subscribe to the Online Course

For ASCP microbiology certification preparation, you must join an online course like the MLSIAcademy ASCP microbiology course review program that not only blesses you with amazing services but also the ASCP microbiology study plan and how to pass the ASCP microbiology action plan.

Recommended Study Plan and Resources

Your ASCP microbiology study plan should include effective study tools that eliminate your struggle and speed up your learning process.

For this, you subscribe to the MLSIA ASCP microbiology course, which provides you with all the necessary tools.

The following are the services of MLSIAcademy:

ASCP Microbiology Live Classes

After your subscription, you will get a link to access the live classes.

These classes are designed and delivered by ASCP-certified experts who also have MSc and Ph.D. degrees.

You can interact with professors and clear your confusion in the MLSIA live classes.

Recordings of Classes

Are you unable to attend the classes regularly due to your busy schedule?

Do not worry, you can get the recordings of lectures to compensate for your study loss.

These recordings are available within 24 hrs after the lectures.

ASCP Microbiology Study Guide

Make sure you implement the ASCP microbiology study guide in your ASCP microbiology study plan.

If you have subscribed to the MLSIA ASCP microbiology prep course, you will receive a comprehensive, conclusive, and all-in-one study guide that meets all your preparation expectations.

This study guide digests a lot of other books that the board recommends for preparation.

Besides this, MLSIA experts are struggling a lot to make this study guide easy-to-understand by using visual illustrations, simple words, easy vocabulary, etc.

ASCP Microbiology QBanks

The ASCP microbiology QBanks offer you many tools to practice the exam content area.

By using these tools, you can improve your time management skills, understand the final exam format, and know your knowledge gap.

The following are the tools that you will get from MLSIA ASCP microbiology QBanks:

ASCP Microbiology Q&A Module

These are the bundle of hundreds of questions that are picked from the entire exam content area.

ASCP Microbiology Quiz Modules

This module comprises the topic-specific questions and answers:

You will get

Topic-specific quizzes
Chapter-specific quizzes
Subject-specific quizzes
Entire syllabus-specific quizzes

Flashcards

MLSIA QBanks also presents flashcards to its students.

The information that is spread on cards is easily digestible.

Practice Exam

You will receive a series of practice exams: each comprising 100 multiple-choice questions.

There are no time limits to solve them, you can use these practice exams according to your ASCP microbiology study plan.

Mock Exam

The mock is the real image of the final exam in all aspects.

By participating in it, you will understand the format of the ASCP M/SM exam clearly.

The MLSIA mock exam is composed of 100 MCQs and the given time frame to complete it is 180 minutes.

CAT Exam

The CAT (computer adaptive testing) is the format of the ASCP/ASCPi M/SM exam.

The MLSIA QBanks also conduct an exam that is formulated by CAT.

This is a real copy of the ASCP final exam.

MLSIAcademy.com offers its students the opportunity to sit in the MLSIA CAT exam before going for the ASCP M/SM final exam, so that they are ready for the exam and deal with all situations if they face any.

Study Tips and Strategies

To pass the ASCP microbiology technologist and specialist exam, you must apply the following tips:

Understand the Format and Exam Content Area

First and foremost, you should understand the exam content area that the board determines for your certificate.

Make sure to understand it with question percentage so that you can comprehend where you need to put maximum and minimum attention.

To understand the exam format, you should go for the MLSIA mock and CAT exams.

Practice Exam and Mock Exam

To perform well, you should track your progress by participating in practice exams and mock exams.

MLSIAcademy.com offers you a series of practice exams enough to make you master of your field.

You can use them at any time and as often as you want.

The MLSIA mock exam depicts the real image of ASCP M/SM

Book the M/SM Exam at the Right Time

The right time to book the exam is when you have covered 85% of exam content area.

Because, after approval of your application, you have only three months to schedule and take the exam.

Subscribe the Online Course

Subscribing to an online course increases the chances of getting your dream certificate.

For this, you must trust MLSIAcadmy, which has been at the top of the market for many years, to provide the best services.

After the Exam: What Next?

After passing/failing the exam, you will receive your score report within four business days.

Getting the score report attentively is necessary, whether you have passed or failed the exam.

If you have passed the exam, you will not be considered an ASCP certified professional without a score report.

This score report includes your earning score and certificate expiration date.

Make sure to meet your ASCP renewal certification requirements within your active three years.

For this, you should set reminders that remind you about the CMP (Credential Maintenance Program) program.

But, if you have failed the exam, you should apply for it after receiving your score report so that you may know which content areas pushed you toward failure.

More about other ASCP Courses by MLSIA.

Resources: ASCP BOC.