The exam is normally delivered face to face in London, at the Royal College of Anaesthetists building in Red Lion Square. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic the April 2020 exam was cancelled, as were many other specialty examinations. HEE informed professional bodies in June 2020 that all exams must be delivered to support training progression. The FICM considered factors such as candidates’ and examiners’ availability due to clinical commitments, the ability to travel and the safety of all those involved.
Because of uncertainty in these issues, and the desire to provide reassurance to candidates, the decision was made to deliver the October 2020 exam on-line, with candidates and examiners at home, using the Zoom platform. The on-line format was designed to mimic as far as possible the face-to-face exam, and contains the same number of stations, the questions from the same question bank, and is delivered by the same examiners.
We had hoped to return to in-person exams but, due to continued uncertainty related to the pandemic, have been unable to do so. Our aim is to deliver the exam in London as soon as is practical.
The modifications required to deliver the exam on-line were approved by GMC and have not changed between the three online sittings in October 2020, March 2021, and October 2021.
The FFICM OSCE question bank contains very few questions which test practical skills such as examination of patients or procedures, so almost all the questions in the bank were suitable to deliver in the online format. The simulation questions were re-written to account for the online format (see below).
