SURGICAL FINALS Passing the Clinical - PasTest

3The OSCEs andshor t casesObjective structured clinical examination (OSCE) assesses a broad rangeof knowledge and skills in a quantifiable, valid and reliable form. TheOSCE aims to assess your factual recall, your interpretative skills, yourdecision making, your behavioural attitude in professional practice andyour ability to perform particular practical tasks. It ensures that each ofyou is presented with the same material and therefore provides a uniformevaluation and marking system.The OSCE often includes short cases. These are probably the most difficultpart of the clinical examination because you will be required to examinea patient under the eagle eye of one or two examiners. The examiners willwatch for three things.1. A caring and competent approachYou should always introduce yourself, say what you would like to do andask permission (see page 8). Fully expose the part of the body that youwish to examine. Remember to compare both sides: if the examiner tellsyou to examine one leg, always expose the other leg as well. However,keep the patient ‘decent’, eg when exposing the legs, cover the groin.Before palpation, never forget to ask if there is any tenderness. The patientshould be comfortable at all times. Thank the patient and cover him or herup before presenting your findings.2. A good examination techniqueYour examination of the short cases should be a smooth, thoroughand slick performance. The only way to achieve this is to practise againand again so that the routine becomes second nature. Find a colleagueto work with and examine under observed and, whenever possible,supervised conditions.12