An advanced objective structured clinical examination using patient simulators to evaluate pharmacy students' skills in physical assessment.

OBJECTIVE:To implement an advanced objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) in the curriculum and to evaluate Japanese pharmacy students' skills in physical assessment such as measuring pulse and blood pressure, and assessing heart, lung, and intestinal sounds. DESIGN:An advanced OSCE was implemented in a hospital pharmacy seminar as a compulsory subject. We programmed patient simulators with 21 different patient cases in which normal and abnormal physiological conditions were produced. The virtual patients were then used to evaluate the physical assessment skills of fifth-year pharmacy students. ASSESSMENT:Significant differences were observed between the average of all the detailed evaluations and the mean results for the following skills: pulse measurement, blood pressure measurement, deflating the cuff at a rate of 2-3 mmHg/sec, listening to heart sounds, and listening to lung sounds. CONCLUSION:Administering an advanced OSCE using virtual patients was an effective way of assessing pharmacy students' skills in a realistic setting. Several areas in which pharmacy students require further training were identified.