diff --git a/doc/bdev_module.md b/doc/bdev_module.md
index 24a08df4b..6ada6bd0d 100644
--- a/doc/bdev_module.md
+++ b/doc/bdev_module.md
@@ -34,8 +34,8 @@ initialization (`module_init`) and teardown (`module_fini`) functions,
 the function that returns context size (`get_ctx_size`) - scratch space that
 will be allocated in each I/O request for use by this module, and a callback
 that will be called each time a new bdev is registered by another module
-(`examine`). Please check the documentation of struct spdk_bdev_module for
-more details.
+(`examine_config` and `examine_disk`). Please check the documentation of
+struct spdk_bdev_module for more details.
 
 ## Creating Bdevs
 
diff --git a/include/spdk/bdev_module.h b/include/spdk/bdev_module.h
index 1a767a235..79b06b65a 100644
--- a/include/spdk/bdev_module.h
+++ b/include/spdk/bdev_module.h
@@ -119,7 +119,12 @@ struct spdk_bdev_module {
 	 * First notification that a bdev should be examined by a virtual bdev module.
 	 * Virtual bdev modules may use this to examine newly-added bdevs and automatically
 	 * create their own vbdevs, but no I/O to device can be send to bdev at this point.
-	 * Only vbdevs based on config files can be created here.
+	 * Only vbdevs based on config files can be created here. This callback must make
+	 * its decision to claim the module synchronously.
+	 * It must also call spdk_bdev_module_examine_done() before returning. If the module
+	 * needs to perform asynchronous operations such as I/O after claiming the bdev,
+	 * it may define an examine_disk callback.  The examine_disk callback will then
+	 * be called immediately after the examine_config callback returns.
 	 */
 	void (*examine_config)(struct spdk_bdev *bdev);
 
diff --git a/lib/bdev/bdev.c b/lib/bdev/bdev.c
index dbba28d12..95eccba2b 100644
--- a/lib/bdev/bdev.c
+++ b/lib/bdev/bdev.c
@@ -3721,6 +3721,10 @@ spdk_bdev_start(struct spdk_bdev *bdev)
 	}
 
 	if (bdev->internal.claim_module) {
+		if (bdev->internal.claim_module->examine_disk) {
+			bdev->internal.claim_module->internal.action_in_progress++;
+			bdev->internal.claim_module->examine_disk(bdev);
+		}
 		return;
 	}