Simple moulage for improving simulation for objective structured clinical examinations in undergraduate dermatology courses.

BACKGROUND: Objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) is being increasingly used as an assessment tool for undergraduate dermatology courses. One of the practical difficulties in conducting OSCEs in dermatology is getting patients with typical skin lesions which can be used for the whole group to ensure uniformity of assessment. We present a study on the use of simple moulage techniques to create uniform and standardized skin lesions for OSCEs in dermatology. METHODS: As a first step, the dermatology faculty in our department chose the clinical conditions which could be covered by using moulages. The main criteria considered were the importance of the condition to the exam blueprint, ease of making and resistance to handling (should not require frequent retouching). Moulages were created on volunteers after taking consent and the same were used in OSCEs s for a group of 5th-year students (N = 102). Difficulty and discrimination indices were compared between the stations using the moulage and the other stations. Qualitative feedback was obtained regarding the same from both the faculty and the students. RESULTS: There was consensus among the faculty and the majority of the students that the lesions were clearly recognizable. As far as other psychometrics were concerned, average difficulty and discrimination of the stations using the moulage were good (average difficulty index-0.78 and average discrimination index-0.68) and compared favorably with the other stations (average difficulty index-0.77 and average discrimination index-0.57). LIMITATIONS: Limited number of stations included, lack of detailed item analysis and lack of feedback from the simulated patients were the main limitations in this study. CONCLUSION: For most common skin conditions creating moulages to simulate the corresponding lesions is an easy procedure and can be an effective tool to standardize dermatology OSCEs for undergraduates, especially in resource-poor settings.

Validation of a computer based objective structured clinical examination in the assessment of undergraduate dermatology courses.

Many teaching centers have now adopted objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) as an assessment method for undergraduate dermatology courses. A modification of the standard OSCE in dermatology is computer based or electronic OSCE (eOSCE). We attempted to validate the use of a computer-based OSCE in dermatology in a group of fifth year medical students. The scores of the students in the computer-based OSCE showed a strong positive correlation with the scores on the clinical presentation (Pearson's co-efficient - 0.923, P value <0.000, significant at the 0.01 level) and a good correlation with overall scores of the student (Pearson's co-efficient - 0.728, P value <0.000, significant at the 0.01 level), indicating that this is a reliable method for assessment in dermatology. Generally, the students' feedback regarding the methods was positive.