Search PubMed⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

Sydney Smee

Publications and source records attributed to Sydney Smee.

4 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2007

Is it feasible to include a technical skill station on a national licensing examination?

The purpose of the current study was to assess the feasibility and validity of including a technical skill station on a national licensing examination. At the 2003 Medical Council of Canada Qualifying Examination, 745 test takers participated in a pilot station assessing the ability to perform a technical procedure. Checklists and rating scales were used for scoring. Validity was investigated by comparing surgery-trained to non-surgery-trained test takers. The mean for the pilot station was 72.4%. The pilot station was moderately correlated to the rest of the examination (item-total correlation .43). The mean score for surgery test takers was higher than for other test takers (P < .001). Inclusion of a technical skill station on a high-stakes examination is feasible, and at many levels, there is evidence of the validity of including this station.

Canada↗
PubMed2005

A comparison of physician examiners and trained assessors in a high-stakes OSCE setting.

BACKGROUND: The Medical Council of Canada (MCC) administers an objective structured clinical examination for licensure. Traditionally, physician examiners (PE) have evaluated these examinees. Recruitment of physicians is becoming more difficult. Determining if alternate scorers can be used is of increasing importance. METHOD: In 2003, the MCC ran a study using trained assessors (TA) simultaneously with PEs. Four examination centers and three history-taking stations were selected. Health care workers were recruited as the TAs. RESULTS: A 3x2x4 mixed analyses of variance indicated no significant difference between scorers (F1,462=.01, p=.94). There were significant interaction effects, which were, localized to site 1/station 3, site 3/station 2, and site 4/station1. Pass/fail decisions would have misclassified 14.4-25.01% of examinees. CONCLUSION: Trained assessors may be a valid alternative to PE for completing checklists in history-taking stations, but their role in completing global ratings is not supported by this study.

Canada↗
PubMed1997

Using the Judgments of Physician Examiners in Setting the Standards for a National Multi-center High Stakes OSCE.

In 1994 and 1995, the Medical Council of Canada used an innovative approach to set the pass mark on its large scale, multi-center national OSCE which is designed to assess basic clinical and communication skills in physicians in Canada after 15 months of post-graduate medical training. The goal of this article is to describe the new approach and to present the experience with the method during its first two years of operation. The approach utilizes the global judgments of the physician examiners at each station to identify the candidates with borderline performances. The scores of the candidates whose performances are judged to be borderline are summed for each station, yielding an initial passing score for all stations and then the examination as a whole. The latter score is then adjusted upward one standard error of measurement for the final passing score and is used as one of the criteria to pass the examination. Based on the results to date, the new approach has worked well. The advantages, disadvantages and areas of possible refinement for the approach are reviewed.

Journal Article↗