Attitudes of Academic Staff and Students towards the Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) in Obstetrics and Gynaecology

Abstract

Introduction: The Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology first implemented the Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) in the final examinations in 2003 academic year to replace the long case and oral examination on short cases and to evaluate the attitude of staff and medical students towards OSCE as a method of clinical assessment. Methods: Three main groups were evaluated: 1) 96 medical students at their final examination in Obstetrics and Gynaecology and were assessed with OSCE; 2) 30 Kuwait trained doctors who were assessed with OSCE during their undergraduate training; 3) academic staff made up internal faculty staff (12) and external examiners. Results: Perception of examination was highly positive among the students: Quality of instruction and organization (96%), transparency of the process (96%), method of assessing clinical skills (90%), patients’ care (89%), assessment of knowledge (84%) and communication skills (84%). Significantly, more of the trainee doctors that had OSCE during their training (92%) had positive perception of OSCE than those trainees (65%) that did not ( P < 0.05). Both the internal and external examiners had an equally high perception of OSCE (83% versus 92%; P = 0.85), citing less examiner fatigue and more enjoyable for examiners and students. Conclusion: OSCE may be a more appropriate choice for graduation examinations of compared to the conventional clinical examination. It is expensive in terms of manpower requirement. There should be continuing research to reduce stress to students and examiners.