Fifth year medical student, Kgothatso Legong, explains his preparation for an upcoming clinical competency assessment during his studies at Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University.

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In an OSCE, students get assessed for clinical competency. A student can be given an actual patient for them to clerk and examine on a limited time period and then after present to their senior doctors, most often being a consultant or a register.

The block which I am currently rotating in, surgery, does not only encompass General Surgery. It also has Paediatric Surgery; Plastic, Reconstructive & Burns Surgery; Urology; Cardiothoracic Surgery; and lastly Neurosurgery.

Yes, all this is overwhelming. I mean we have an early morning lecture at Seven O’clock in the morning, then a morning lecture afterwards. From there on we might attend morning ward rounds, but that depends on the probability of having a third class in the morning or not.

General Surgery has a span of nine unit rotations in fifth year. Namely, colorectal, minimal visceral, transplant, breast, trauma, acute care, vascular, head and neck, and endocrine. Last year, I rotated in minimal visceral first before going to endocrine.

Because we are not allowed to rotate in one unit more than twice throughout the clinical years, I had to be in different units this time around in fifth year. I got the privilege to start with vascular rotation and then move on to trauma. The first unit rotation spans for three weeks whiles the second one spans for one week less than the former.

Both the consultants and registrars in vascular were very kind and generous enough to teach. At the end of our vascular rotation, my unit mates and I were assessed through OSCE (Objective Structured Clinical Examination). This is how I prepared:

1. Know your patients

Vascular unit had a limited number of patients. This was a problem for us because for the three weeks we were in the wards with our doctors we would almost see the same patients over and over again.

The reason why vascular had so few patients was because their duration at the hospital is long. Unlike trauma where the patients can be discharged in a matter of 5 days if they are not complicated. In preparation for OSCE, it is important to

clerk as many patient as you can and examine them. This knowledge would prove to be very valuable in case you get assigned the same patient for OSCE.

2. Read up on your patients

After you have clerked, go and read on the condition your patient has. Research on the pathophysiology of the disease and plan of management. It will prove to be of a high advantage if you extend your research to find out what the current literature says.

3. Study beyond

You cannot always be too prepared for OSCE. You must also plan for a possibility that what if they give you a patient who was not in your assigned unit? Or what if they give you a patient who just got admitted on that day? To prepare for this you need to study as much as you can on other conditions.

Surgery rotation is continuing to be a very stressful block rotation. But I believe I will conquer it.