THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN FACULTY WARD EVALUATIONS, OSCE, AND ABSITE AS MEASURES OF SURGICAL INTERN PERFORMANCE

BACKGROUND: This study determined the degree to which ward evaluations , the American Board of Surgery In-Training Examination (ABSITE), and an Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) provide equivalent infofmation about intern performance. METHODS: Twenty-two general sur gery interns completed both the ABSITE and a 17-problem, 35-station OS CE. Faculty members completed several 12-item ward evaluations for eac h intern. Pearson product-moment correlations were employed to determi ne the degree of association among the various evaluation measures. RE SULTS: The total OSCE score correlated with both the total ABSITE scor e and the overall ward evaluations, but the latter two measures did no t correlate with each other. The ward evaluations identified the perfo rmance of 1 of the 22 interns (5%) as deficient, the ABSITE identified 9 (41%) as deficient in knowledge, and the OSCE 8 (36%). CONCLUSIONS: In the future, performance-based testing methods such as the OSCE sho uld become more important as an evaluative parameter in assessing the clinical performance of postgraduate surgical trainees.