Relationship between standardized patient checklist item accuracy and performing arts experience

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Clinical Skills Assessment
• Standardized Patient Methodology

Background:

• The influence of a Standardized Patient's (SP) performing arts background on their accuracy in clinical skills examinations is unknown.
• High-stakes assessments, like the Comprehensive Osteopathic Medical Licensing Examination Level 2 Performance Evaluation, rely on accurate SP performance recording.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate differences in recording accuracy for history and physical examination checklist items between SPs with and without performing arts experience.
• To determine if performing arts background affects SP accuracy in high-stakes clinical skills evaluations.

Main Methods:

• Compared live SP ratings with video-verified ratings for 1972 SP encounters across 40 cases.
• Categorized 40 SPs as either performing artists or non-performing artists.
• Analyzed differences in checklist recording accuracy based on performing arts experience.

Main Results:

• Overall agreement rates were high (uncorrected: 0.94, chance-corrected: 0.79).
• No statistically significant differences in accuracy were found between SPs with and without performing arts backgrounds for history taking, physical examination, or overall data gathering.
• Specific accuracy measures for history taking (P = 0.678), physical examination (P = 0.072), and data gathering (P = 0.417) showed no significant variations between groups.

Conclusions:

• SPs, regardless of performing arts background, exhibit high precision in completing history and physical examination checklist items.
• The recruitment of SPs with or without performing arts experience is viable for high-stakes clinical skills examinations without compromising integrity or accuracy.