title: Practice simulated office orals as a predictor of Certification examination performance in family medicine.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine if performance on practice simulated office orals (SOOs) conducted during residency training could predict residents' performance on the SOO component of the College of Family Physicians of Canada's (CFPC's) final Certification examination.
  
  
  METHODS
  Prospective cohort study.
  
  
  METHODS
  University of Ottawa in Ontario.
  
  
  METHODS
  Family medicine residents enrolled in the University of Ottawa's Family Medicine Residency program between July 1, 2012, and June 30, 2014, who were eligible to write the CFPC Certification examination in the spring of 2014 and who had participated in all 4 practice SOO examination sessions; 23 residents met these criteria.
  
  
  METHODS
  Scores on practice SOO sessions during fall 2012, spring 2013, fall 2013, and spring 2014; and the SOO component score on the spring 2014 administration of the CFPC Certification examination.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Weighted least squares regression analysis using the 4 practice SOO session scores significantly predicted the final Certification examination SOO score (P< .05), with an adjustedR2value of 0.29. Additional analysis revealed that the mean scores for the cohort generated at each time point were statistically different from each other (P< .001) and that the relationship over time could be represented by either a linear relationship or a quadratic relationship. A generalizability study generated a relative generalizability coefficient of 0.63.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our results confirm the usefulness of practice SOOs as a progress test and demonstrate the feasibility of using them to predict final scores on the SOO component of the CFPC's Certification examination.
authors.affiliation: Assistant Professor in the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Ottawa in Ontario, a doctoral student in the PhD in Family Medicine program at Western University in London, Ont, and a member of the College of Family Physicians of Canada's Board of Examiners Committee. knoel100@uottawa.ca.
authors.forename: Kendall
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Noel
authors.affiliation: Assistant Professor and Education Researcher in the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Ottawa.
authors.forename: Douglas
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Archibald
authors.affiliation: Emeritus Professor at Laval University in Quebec city, Que, and is a consultant in testing and assessment at the College of Family Physicians of Canada in Mississauga, Ont.
authors.forename: Carlos
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Brailovsky
mesh_terms: D002568:Certification / Q000379:methods*; D004521:Educational Measurement / Q000379:methods*; D005194:Family Practice / Q000193:education*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007396:Internship and Residency; D008297:Male; D009864:Ontario; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012044:Regression Analysis; D000066908:Simulation Training / Q000379:methods*; D013997:Time Factors