Summative assessment of 5thyear medical students’ clinical reasoning by script concordance test: requirements and challenges

BMC Medical Education

Research Article

Bernard Charlin¹  Paul Duggan² 

[1] CPASS, direction de la recherche, Faculté de Médecine, Université de Montréal, CP 6128, Succursale centre- ville, H3C 3 J7, Montréal, Québec, Canada;Discipline of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, The University of Adelaide, Frome Rd, 5000, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia;

关键词: Multiple Choice Question;    Clinical Reasoning;    Item Banking;    Reference Panel;    Summative Assessment;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1472-6920-12-29

 received in 2011-09-14, accepted in 2012-03-23,  发布年份 2012

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThe Script Concordance Test (SCT) has not been reported in summative assessment of students across the multiple domains of a medical curriculum. We report the steps used to build a test for summative assessment in a medical curriculum.MethodsA 51 case, 158-question, multidisciplinary paper was constructed to assess clinical reasoning in 5th-year. 10–16 experts in each of 7 discipline-based reference panels answered questions on-line. A multidisciplinary group considered reference panel data and data from a volunteer group of 6th Years, who sat the same test, to determine the passing score for the 5th Years.ResultsThe mean (SD) scores were 63.6 (7.6) and 68.6 (4.8) for the 6th Year (n = 23, alpha = 0.78) and and 5th Year (n = 132, alpha =0.62) groups (p < 0.05), respectively. The passing score was set at 4 SD from the expert mean. Four students failed.ConclusionsThe SCT may be a useful method to assess clinical reasoning in medical students in multidisciplinary summative assessments. Substantial investment in training of faculty and students and in the development of questions is required.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Duggan and Charlin; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2012