Construction of Multiple Choice Questions Before and After An Educational Intervention

Area of Science:

• Medical Education
• Assessment Methods

Background:

• Khesar Gyalpo University of Medical Sciences of Bhutan established in 2014.
• Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs) are a standard assessment tool in medical education.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the effectiveness of a workshop on MCQ development for medical educators.
• To assess the impact of standardized MCQ development guidelines on question quality.

Main Methods:

• A quasi-experimental study involving 16 intern doctors.
• MCQs were developed by untrained faculty, then revised after a workshop on standard guidelines.
• Analysis included performance, difficulty, discrimination index, and distractor effectiveness.

Main Results:

• Post-workshop pass percentage increased from 69.8% to 81.3%.
• Difficulty factor slightly increased from 0.51 to 0.53.
• Discrimination index decreased from 0.59 to 0.47, and distractor effectiveness decreased from 83.3% to 74.9%.

Conclusions:

• The MCQ development workshop was valuable for medical educators.
• The workshop positively influenced learning and performance in MCQ creation.
• Further refinement of guidelines may be needed to improve discrimination and distractor effectiveness.