Together Dental Corporate Dentistry Group, and Community Dental Services, Essex, UK.
College of Pharmacy, QU Health, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar.
Eur J Dent Educ. 2023 Nov;27(4):802-814. doi: 10.1111/eje.12869. Epub 2022 Nov 20.
Objective structured clinical examinations (OSCEs) are an essential examination tool within undergraduate dental education. Fear of spread of the COVID-19 virus led to dental institutions exploring alternative means of conducting OSCEs. The aim of this scoping review was to investigate what structures, processes and outcomes of dental OSCEs were reported during the COVID-19 pandemic.
This scoping review was conducted and reported adhering to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses extension for scoping review guidelines (PRISMA-ScR). Published literature was identified through a systematic search of PubMed, Embase, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Education Resources Information Center (Eric), ProQuest and Google Scholar. Identified articles were independently reviewed by two authors (KS, AD), followed by synthesis in terms of the reported structures, processes and outcomes. Articles reporting cancellation or rescheduling were also included, extracting data on reasons and any suggestions/recommendations.
The search yielded a total of 290 studies of which 239 sources were excluded after removal of duplicates, leaving 51 studies for title and abstract evaluation. Thirty-four articles were excluded as they did not report on the topic of interest, leaving 17 for full-text evaluation, of which nine were analysed according to the pre-set themes. All dental OSCEs taking place (n = 6) were conducted online whilst the remaining (n = 3) were either cancelled or rescheduled. Data on structures reported specific online videoconferencing software used and provision of staff and student training. Processes on the execution of online OSCEs varied significantly from one study to the other, providing rich data on how dental institutions may carry out such assessments tailored to their need. Information regarding outcomes was sparse, as little attention was paid to the results of the students compared to pre-pandemic, lacking investigation into reliability and validity of online dental OSCEs.
Dental OSCEs could be conducted online implementing well-planned structures and processes; however, further evidence is needed to prove its reliability and validity based on outcomes. Dental institutions may need to consider alternative methods to assess practical competencies if online OSCEs are to take place.
客观结构化临床考试（OSCE）是本科牙科教育中必不可少的考试工具。由于担心 COVID-19 病毒的传播，牙科机构正在探索进行 OSCE 的替代方法。本范围综述的目的是调查在 COVID-19 大流行期间报告的牙科 OSCE 的结构、过程和结果。
本范围综述按照系统评价和荟萃分析扩展的首选报告项目（PRISMA-ScR）指南进行，并进行了报告。通过对 PubMed、Embase、护理和联合健康文献累积索引（CINAHL）、教育资源信息中心（Eric）、ProQuest 和 Google Scholar 的系统搜索，确定了已发表的文献。由两名作者（KS、AD）独立审查确定的文章，然后根据报告的结构、过程和结果进行综合。还包括报告取消或重新安排的文章，提取有关原因和任何建议/建议的相关数据。
搜索共产生了 290 项研究，其中 239 项在去除重复项后被排除，留下 51 项进行标题和摘要评估。34 篇文章因未报告相关主题而被排除在外，留下 17 篇进行全文评估，其中 9 篇根据预设主题进行了分析。所有进行的牙科 OSCE（n=6）均在线进行，而其余的（n=3）要么被取消，要么被重新安排。报告的结构数据具体说明了在线视频会议软件的使用情况以及工作人员和学生培训的提供情况。执行在线 OSCE 的过程因一项研究而异，提供了有关牙科机构如何根据自己的需求进行此类评估的丰富数据。关于结果的信息很少，与大流行前相比，学生的成绩几乎没有得到关注，缺乏对在线牙科 OSCE 可靠性和有效性的调查。
牙科 OSCE 可以通过实施精心计划的结构和流程在线进行；但是，需要进一步的证据来证明其基于结果的可靠性和有效性。如果要进行在线 OSCE，则牙科机构可能需要考虑替代方法来评估实践能力。
