Early Pre-clerkship Clinical Skills Assessments Predict Clerkship Performance

Assessment of medical students' clinical skills (CS) remains a challenge. Little is known about early predictors of future CS performance. This study examines the relationship between students' pre-clerkship clinical skills (PCCS) performance and year 3 clerkship performance measures.

The authors performed a retrospective analysis of four medical student cohorts who matriculated between 2014 and 2017 and participated in a longitudinal pre-clerkship CS curriculum. A total of 440 students were included in the analyses. Students' clinical skills were assessed through a series of PCCS exams, each consisting of a single standardized patient encounter. First-year PCCS exams assessed history taking, physical examination, professionalism, and communication skills; second-year PCCS exams also assessed clinical documentation and clinical reasoning skills. Evaluators assigned a grade of "satisfactory," "borderline," or "unsatisfactory" for each skill set. Regression analyses compared year 3 performance outcomes between students with one or more "unsatisfactory" or "borderline" PCCS skill set grades and students assessed as "satisfactory" for all PCCS skill set assessments.

Thirty-two percent (n = 140) of the 440 students had at least one borderline or unsatisfactory (US) PCCS skill set grade. These students performed significantly worse on year 3 National Board of Medical Examiner subject exams, workplace-based clinical performance evaluations, and overall year 3 performance compared to students who passed all PCCS exam components. In addition, a higher percentage of students with PCCS performance deficiencies failed the United States Medical Licensing Examination Step 2 CS exam on the first attempt versus students who passed all PCCS exam components.

PCCS exam performance at our institution aligned with future student performance on multiple year 3 clerkship outcome measures. This pre-clerkship performance data can be used to identify at-risk students who would benefit from additional resources to achieve competency in the clerkship environment and future medical training.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40670-022-01519-8.