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Organising a mock CASC examination
- Pratish B Thakkar, Asif Ramzan, Consultant Forensic Psychiatrist (17 August 2009)
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Pratish B Thakkar, ST6 Forensic Psychiatry Tees Esk and Wear Valley NHS Trust, Asif Ramzan, Consultant Forensic Psychiatrist
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pratish.thakkar{at}tewv.nhs.uk Pratish B Thakkar, et al.
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In a recent article, Paul Wheelan et al., 2009 discussed their experience of running a relatively inexpensive and workforce-light 1-day course and mock CASC examination. They concluded that is was relatively easy to organise and received favourable feedback from the trainees. We would like to share our experience of helping to organise two sets of ‘mock CASC’ course. We organised the course in autumn 2008 and spring 2009 with number limited to ten candidates in both series. We refrained from getting sponsorship from pharmaceutical companies and were completely subsidised by the Medical Development Centre of the trust. The feedback received from the candidates was the free mock CASC examination was as good as, many of the paid courses and majority of the candidates went on to pass the CASC examination. We were lucky to have a current college examiner who helped us to validate the actual stations and advise on running of the event. The author (PT) had attended the mock CASC examination organised by the Royal College as a candidate which helped immensely in understanding the process and getting ideas for possible scenarios which could be asked in the actual exam. The examiners were picked from different subspecialties and matched with the scenarios. The examiners were given a short talk by the college examiner on the process, marking and expectations from the candidates. The actors were hired from a local agency. Most actors had previously ‘performed’ in the old style OSCE and were familiar with the style. We were oversubscribed by the number of candidates and owing to style of one candidate per station we had to limit the number to ten. We appreciated the style that Paul Wheelan et al, adapted of having 4 candidate-observers in each station with the performing candidate benefitting both the observers and performing candidate. We tried to run the course in the style of the actual exam. Due to shortage of time and space we had blank station which helped to run interlinked and stand alone stations in the same circuit. Following the circuit we had feedback from actors, examiners and candidates. Responses from the actors, regarding body language, use of phrases empathy and general demeanour were particularly well received by the candidates. The problems with running such a course were getting a suitable venue, coaching the examiners who have not examined before. We found that some of the instructions on the college website were vague and not prescriptive enough. Personally we found it a satisfying experience which helped sharpen leadership, management and communication skills. In this era of commercial or industry sponsored coaching for every exam having a having a local freely accessible mock CASC course was appreciated by the candidates. The examiners valued the opportunity to examine as they gained knowledge of the current exam process which they will carry forward to their future trainees. References: http://rcpsych.ac.uk/exams/about/mrcpsychcasc.aspx Declaration of interests: PT has examined on a mock CASC course. |
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