An evaluation of the Team Objective Structured Clinical Examination (TOSCE).
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the validity, reliability and feasibility of the TOSCE, a new means of formative assessment for medical students, from the perspectives of examiners, simulated patients and students.


METHODS
Teams of five students rotate through five clinical stations, performing one of four tasks in turn, whilst the fifth member of the team 'rests'.


METHODS
St George's Hospital Medical School, London.


METHODS
Third-year medical students, their examiners and simulated patients.


RESULTS
All participants felt the TOSCE session had high validity although some students were unfamiliar with some subjects. Stations were double-marked and agreement rates and Cohen's Kappa ranged from 67 to 94% and 0.04-0.88, respectively. Analysis of the causes of disagreement led to improved marking schedules and enhanced reliability.


CONCLUSIONS
The feasibility of the exercise as a formative assessment was demonstrated by the confidence of the staff participating both as examiners and simulated patients and from the majority of students who welcomed the learning experience.
Singleton
A
A
Division of General Practice and Primary Care, St George's Hospital Medical School, London, UK.
Smith
F
F
Harris
T
T
Ross-Harper
R
R
Hilton
S
S
D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate / Q000379:methods*; D004521:Educational Measurement; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D006801:Humans; D016544:Patient Simulation; D010808:Physical Examination