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The Final Assessments – See you on the other side!
The Pre-reg out there are nearing the end, and after 7-9 months of combining work and study, are now banished to the books, revising for the Final Assessment. After two degrees and two sets of professional exams, I sympathise thoroughly with you all - we have all been through it. Be reassured though. The exams are stressful, and although some people say it’s a myth, most examiners do want you to pass.
I’m sure you have found that the year to date seems very variable when talking to your friends. Some will have found the quarterly assessments a breeze with little work involved, whilst others will have been asked a barrage of questions every 3 months that appeared never ending and the questions getting exponentially harder. For the Final Assessment though, the playing field is level and my experience is that the examiners are fairly even throughout.
The final assessment is about making sure you are fit to practice. Yes, you are expected to be knowledgeable, but the deepest theories about the hardest subjects should have been covered in the quarterly assessments. It is not physically possible in the short amount of time for each exam to cover the whole syllabus. So target your revision. Look at the core competencies. These are what are been examined. Can you take a good case history? Can you refract accurately? Can you recognise a suspicious optic disc.? (Can we all, Peter? –J)
Take each exam as a separate entity. When that section is completed, forget about it. You cannot change the results. Thinking about errors will only distract you from the next exam.
Unlike me, hopefully most of you will have been on some kind of revision program or preparation course. These are run mainly by examiners, and give you an accurate guide to the exam style and this inside knowledge is the best armour you can have. After all, they will be sitting the other side of the table.Â
Jane Macnaughton // May 12, 2007 at 3:32 am
There are many articles which have been ‘tagged’ for Pre-registered optometrists within these pages - clicking on ‘Pre-reg’ in the Topic bar will put them collectively within one page.
In addition, it seems to me that a few tips and hints would be useful here.
As a College Examiner who has examined over both systems, the old style PQE and the new style Final Assessment here are my two top tips:
1. Routine: the most common reason for failing this exam is running out of time. Be practising the routine now; have someone watch you. Have a clock and time yourself - at the half way point (20 minutes) you should have completed History & Symptoms, and all the initial ‘twiddly bits’ such as CT, motility, confrontation (but only if indicated or appropriate) and retinoscopy. The refraction, write up and advice should be the following 20 minutes with enough time for a quick check over.
2. Contact lenses: Slit Lamp examination is one of the most likely areas to fail this exam. Make sure you are hot on this equipment, able to discuss and quantify (where appropriate) what you re looking at. And don’t miss any staining - a direct fail.
Peter Chapman // May 14, 2007 at 4:01 am
Refraction – 45 minutes – the Non Examiner’s View
“Do exactly what it says on the tin�
Key areas are:
Case history and symptoms,
Accurate ret and refraction (don’t forget things like +0.25DS sphere increase for every -0.50DC increase, working distances)
Direct Ophthalmoscopy (get nice and close)
Cover tests (distance and near)
Are the tests you are doing relevant (is it worthwhile binocular balancing a 75 year old?)
Do a normal routine. You will not have anything too messy to examine but be prepared to extend questioning in history and symptoms/ think about systemic disease. (My patient suffered from arthritis and was on steroids- think supplementary tests).
Your examiner will probably check your ret result and may ask just a few questions to clarify any findings.
Peter Chapman // May 22, 2007 at 12:05 am
Ocular Disease
This exam is split into two parts. Its aim is to ensure you can identify common pathology and know how to make a differential diagnosis. Onward management comes in to it a lot here.
Station Exam – Patient cases and pictures. You will be shown pictures of conditions or asked to examine patients. You will need to describe the condition and then suggest a diagnosis and then say what you would do with it. Say what you see. 1 task will involve (Volk) indirect ophthalmoscopy, there is always 1 contact lens complication (picture or patient)and there will be 1 binocular vision patient to examine. At least 4 of the following conditions will be presented in the exam in one format or another:
· Anomaly of binocular vision
· Maculopathy
· Glaucoma
· Cataract
· Retinal vascular disease
· Anterior eye abnormalities
Viva. This is 30 minutes with 1 examiner, essentially testing that you can identify between sight threatening and non sight threatening conditions. You will be asked about conditions, pathogenesis, risk factors, and treatments. Most questions are about common ocular conditions. Look at the competencies that need to be ‘ticked off’ and focus your preparation round these. Focus on management.
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