Retrospectively speaking, medical school is actually fun.
It is like a wild series of exams, stacked one after the other in the name of exams in college of medicine... Honestly, they need to start video recording these exams because they would make the best comedy show anyone would ever witness in his or her lifetime
Osce stands for Objective Structured Clinical Examination.
In these exams, many dramas are brought into play because of the tension that comes with it and also the phobia of not knowing exactly where the questions will be coming from not to talk of the ridiculously short time allocated to each station ( usually just 3 minutes).
It involves moving from one station to another answering specific question for each station, which could be oral, written or eliciting/demonstrating physical signs.
Let's Dive Into It Already
During our 4th professional exam, in the Obstetrics and Gynecology OSCE,
One of the stations required passing a speculum ( a medical instrument used to visualise the cervix) into a pelvic model.
Dramas are almost in all stations but then the levels were something else in this station but the beauty of this station was that immediately after the station comes the rest station where you take 3 minutes break to calm yourself down ahead of other stations, hehe.
I was in my rest station when the next candidate arrived. The speculum they provided wasn't actually the one we were used to so it was a bit difficult for us all that passed through that circuit as we struggled with it.
It was in this tough struggle of arranging this device amidst the short time, and you know this myth of things getting more difficult when you need them to get done quicker, the examiner could not take it anymore and finally said,"Candidate, why are you struggling with your speculum?"
In the same 4th MBBS, during our paediatrics long case exam, a candidate after examining the patient missed the patient had hepatomegaly (enlargement of the liver)
When they came to the bedside, the consultant examined the child and pointed it out, he quipped to the student, "I didn't know hepatomegaly is an acute sign."
In this same paediatrics long case, one of my classmates claimed he saw cyanosis ( bluish discoloration of the lips).
When they came to the bedside, the consultant didn't see any of the signs of cyanosis (it magically disappeared, hehe) and asked the candidate, "Which bus the cyanosis boarded to go out?"
Out of frustration, he just called upon the nurse, "Nurse! Did you give this patient Oxygen?
The nurse said,"no and sprinkled the answer with, he was given oxygen yesterday."
It happened that the candidate copied the work of another candidate who presented same case yesterday without knowing the cyanosis has resolved.
Needless to way he failed the exam as the consultants concluded it was an obvious mistake to miss.
Fast forward to our final MBBS, Psychiatry was one of the stations in medicine exam, it's always a bit difficult for us because it's not an aspect we get to explore in full.
I already had my own part of the, "who taught you that?" moment, though mine was in a subtle manner.
After going through few stations, I reached the diabetic foot examination station, I don't know what the candidate said in the Psychiatry station that made the examiner shout,
"Shuuuttt uuupp! Who taught you that nonsense?"
It was funny, but the tension of the exam didn't let any of us react, it was just the examiners that got good laughs.
It really wasn't easy passing through those phases of life but guess what?
Resilience and consistency saw us through, hehe
Picture is mine and GIF was gotten from Tenor
Thanks for reading and have a nice day ahead 👍
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