It has a number of distinguishing features, e.g. compared to VSAM: OAM is used in conjunction with IBM Db2.
An example use case for OAM would be storing medical images in a Db2 database running under z/OS.
OAM was created in the 1980s "as a prototype product for an insurance company to replace microfiche."
In 2011 support was added for storage of objects in a z/OS unix file system—either zFS or NFS.
[2] In the 1990s, Object Access Method was used by the Canadian Intellectual Property Office to store documents related to patent processing.