Postgraduate medical journal
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The COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted education-related activities, including the conduct of examinations. We review the literature regarding high-stakes examinations during the pandemic, discuss the decision-making process of whether to proceed with a high-stakes examination and share published experiences in conducting high-stakes examinations during the pandemic. We illustrate our own recent experiences of decision-making and conduct of our high-stakes gastroenterology licencing examinations during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is possible to conduct high-stakes examinations virtually during pandemic situations with fidelity and adherence to the established format and standards.
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Decompensating patients require expeditious and focused care at the bedside. This can be particularly challenging when there are multiple layers of providers, each with differing specialisation, experience and autonomy. We examined the impact of our intensivist-driven hospital-wide rapid response team (RRT) at our 1171-bed quaternary care centre. ⋯ Intensivist-led RRT ensured consistent high value care. Early intervention and consistent supervision enabled timely and efficient delivery of critical care services.
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Little has been published regarding postgraduate assessments during the COVID-19 pandemic. There is an urgent need to graduate well-trained specialists including family physicians who play a key role in patient care. The successes and challenges encountered in mounting qualifying 2020 Family Medicine examinations during the COVID-19 pandemic at the University of the West Indies are described in this paper. Human resource, planning, use of technology and virtual environments are discussed, which enabled successful examinations at this multicampus regional site.