From paper to pixels: a pilot evaluation of the validity and reliability of virtual objective structured clinical examination in emergency medicine training

A cross-sectional pilot validation study found that a 12-station virtual objective structured clinical examination (v-OSCE) showed acceptable validity and reliability in a small group of emergency medicine clinical students. The study included all 12 clinical medical students who participated in an emergency medicine rotation at Jahrom University of Medical Sciences from October to November 2022, with participants recruited by census sampling. The published abstract reports that the virtual assessment was delivered through Adobe Connect at the university’s virtual examination center.

The examination comprised 12 stations or rooms: one rest station and 11 selected emergency medicine topics. Researchers evaluated content validity, criterion validity and reliability. According to the abstract, students’ end-of-rotation ward scores were positively and significantly correlated with their v-OSCE scores (r = 0.644, P = 0.044), which the investigators identified as evidence of criterion validity. Scores from even and odd stations were also positively and significantly correlated (r = 0.71, P = 0.02). Correlations among assessor scores were positive and significant for stations involving disease (P ≥ 0.03).

These findings support the study’s conclusion that a v-OSCE may be a viable assessment tool for emergency medicine education, with acceptable validity and reliability in the population and setting examined. The reported correlations measure associations between assessment results; they do not by themselves establish that the virtual examination captures broader clinical competence or that it performs equivalently to every other assessment format. The analysis was conducted with SPSS version 24, and the paper reports correlations between station and total scores.

The evidence is limited by the pilot design and the sample of 12 students from a single emergency medicine rotation. The available abstract does not describe the detailed procedures for each station, assessor arrangements, the measures used to establish content validity, or uncertainty intervals for the reported correlations. It also does not report comparative performance between virtual and in-person OSCEs. Accordingly, the results support further evaluation of the format but do not establish its effectiveness across larger cohorts, institutions, emergency medicine topics or implementation settings.

Subject of Research: Pilot validation of a virtual OSCE for emergency medicine clinical students

Article Title: From paper to pixels: a pilot evaluation of the validity and reliability of virtual objective structured clinical examination in emergency medicine training

Article References: Mosalanejad, L., Raeyatdost, E., Karimian, Z., Akbari, A., Jahromi, S. A., Karamzadeh, A., Sabaghi, M., & Ramezanli, H. (2026). From paper to pixels: a pilot evaluation of the validity and reliability of virtual objective structured clinical examination in emergency medicine training. BMC Medical Education. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-026-10454-w

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s12909-026-10454-w

Keywords: virtual OSCE, emergency medicine, medical education, clinical assessment, objective structured clinical examination, validity, reliability, pilot study, medical students, paper, pixels, pilot