Recent developments in assessing medical students

Abstract

Summary Most medical schools in the UK are revising their undergraduate courses in response to the recommendations published by the General Medical Council Education Committee in Tomorrow's doctors. However, achievement of the objectives of curricular change is attendant on revision of the assessment process. This paper reviews traditional and more recently developed methods for assessment of medical education in the light of the General Medical Council's recommendations which relate specifically to summative assessment of the core curriculum. The importance of reliability and validity is highlighted, and the case for criterion-referenced assessment is examined.

Student evaluation of an OSCE in paediatrics at the University of the West Indies, Jamaica

“…The assessment of student's clinical competence is of paramount importance, and there are several means of evaluating student performance in medical examinations [1,2]. The Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) is an approach to student assessment in which aspects of clinical competence are evaluated in a comprehensive, consistent and structured manner, with close attention to the objectivity of the process [3].…”

Computer Assisted Objective Structured Clinical Examination: A useful tool for dermatology undergraduate assessment

“…An ideal assessment technique is the one, which can test the acquisition and utilization of core cognitive levels beyond mere recall. [10] OSCE was first developed in 1979 [11] and since then, their utility in various medical specialties has been extensively evaluated. These are multi-stationed clinical examinations, shown to be effective in testing the ability to integrate knowledge, skills and attitudes acquired during training.…”

“…[12] This format has been reported to have high validity and reliability. [10] Over the years, many modifications of OSCE including GOSCE (group OSCE), [13] OSLER (objective structured long examination record), [14] OSVE (objective structured video examination) [15] have been developed and evaluated. OSCE is particularly valuable for dermatology assessments as it effectively tests the visual recognition skills of a dermatology student.…”

Students' perspectives about the medical humanities curriculum at the Catholic University of Korea

“…2, 40 Evans argued that many important learning outcomes are difficult to assess, except retrospectively at the end of a clinical career. 39 Nevertheless, it should be our next step to increase the validity and effectiveness of current assessment methods and develop new assessment methods consistent with the goals of the humanities curriculum.…”