Introducing OSCE as an Assessment Tool for First Year Post Graduate Students in Formative Evaluation in the Department of Surgery, JNMC, DMIMS (DU), Sawangi (M),Wardha, Maharashtra

Medical education aims at the production of competent doctors with sound clinical skills. Competency encompasses six inter-related domains as developed by Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) knowledge, patient care, professionalism, communication and interpersonal skills, practice based learning and improvement, and systems based practice. Assessment of medical graduates is a vital part of medical curricula as the community needs to be protected from incompetent physicians. Objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) introduced by Harden in 1975 is a suitable form of assessing student's clinical competence. The aim of this project was to introduce OSCE as an assessment tool for first year post graduate students in formative evaluation and to assess the psychomotor skill in them. This prospective study was conducted in 6 months from January 2015 to June 2015 in the department of surgery, Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Sawangi (Meghe) Wardha in which twelve first year post graduate students from the department of surgery had participated. It was concluded that OSCE is a very reliable and valid method for evaluating psychomotor skills and progression of clinical and surgical skills of residents of surgical fraternity. Hence, OSCE should become a standard part of resident evaluation.