prepOSCE: A Virtual, Scalable Solution to Prepare Residents for Their OSCE Examination

Abstract

The Royal College Comprehensive Objective Examination in Neurology provides certification for Canadian neurologists and consists of a written examination and the Observed Structured Clinical Encounter (OSCE). The OSCE portion of the certification involves residents visiting several patient stations where they address case scenarios with an examiner. Unfortunately, residents lack exam preparation time due to demanding work hours. In response to resident needs, we created a novel, virtual preparation OSCE program – “prepOSCE” – and evaluated its efficacy. The prepOSCE program employed a proprietary virtual solution from CTC Communications Corp. Ten virtual sessions accommodated 70 residents totally. Seven Canadian physicians and two co-chairs created case scenarios for the stations. On session day, seven residents arrived in a virtual plenary room for briefing followed by assignment to a station by CTC. Residents then moved virtually through prepOSCE stations a different examiner and case scenario in each. Following their session, residents and evaluators were surveyed to capture experiences. The average program rating was 4.22 out of 5 (n = 36 residents of 70 residents who participated in the program) and 4.35 (n = 17 evaluators). Ninety-two percent of residents agreed or strongly agreed that they would recommend this program to their peers; they would like prepOSCE to continue next year; and the program was relevant and added value to their studies. The positive feedback received from prepOSCE participants indicates there is a need for a program like prepOSCE. This model has potential for expansion and it is hoped that specialties outside of neurology could benefit from a similar program.

Feasibility and reliability of the pandemic-adapted online-onsite hybrid graduation OSCE in Japan

“…Many educational facilities for healthcare professionals, including residents, medical, nursing, pharmacy, and dentistry students, rapidly transitioned from traditional in-person OSCEs to virtual OSCEs (also described as remote OSCE, online OSCE, or tele-OSCE) (Felthun et al, 2021a;Malau-Aduli et al, 2022). These virtual OSCEs are satisfactory, feasible, and cost-effective as per survey results (Langenau et al, 2014;Shaban et al, 2021;Shaiba et al, 2021), questionnaire feedbacks (Skrzypek et al, 2022;Motkur et al, 2022;Garofalo et al, 2023), empirical analysis (Felthun et al, 2021b;Minty et al, 2022), and descriptive qualitative studies (Shorbagi et al, 2022;Saad et al, 2022;Thampy et al, 2022;). Although three studies assessed the reliability of virtual OSCEs by calculating Cronbach's alphas, and they were about 0.80 (Oliven et al, 2011(Oliven et al, , 2021Porto et al, 2023), a reliability analysis based on G-theory is yet to be reported (Kunutsor et al, 2022).…”