Bringing Education & Service Together (BEST)

An Objective Structured Teaching Examination (OSTE) for Generalist Resident Physicians

For the resident OSTE at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) College of Medicine, standardized medical students enacted and rated performance on eight OSTE stations after undergoing extensive training to ensure accuracy. All standardized students were senior UCI medical students who participated in a longitudinal elective, "Introduction to Clinical Teaching". Each OSTE station lasted for fifteen minutes, with a five-minute break between stations during which the students complete their ratings. Although no specific feedback was given after the stations, at the end of the OSTE all residents participated in a short debriefing. Twenty-three family medicine, internal medicine and pediatrics residents from UCI participated in a validation study of the resident OSTE and its behaviorally-anchored rating scales during the 2001-02 academic year.¹

Medical educators who would like to use this resident OSTE may contact the BEST study's principal investigator (ehmorrison@earthlink.net). The cases and rating scales will be made available free of charge for research or instructional use in medical education.

¹ Morrison EH, Boker JR, Hollingshead J, Prislin MD, Hitchcock MA, Litzelman DK. Reliability and validity of an objective structured teaching examination for generalist resident teachers. Academic Medicine. 2002;77;S29-S32.