Reviewing the results of qualitative and quantitative analysis of MCQs in Introduction to clinical medicine course

At most of the medical universities, MCQ-based examinations are often use as the first component, particularly to ensure the candidates have an adequate knowledge base, prior to entering subsequent clinical examinations.

In ICM, 3973 MCQs were collected from tests over a four-year period from 2005 to2009. Questions were evaluated for 10 frequently occurring item writing flows, for cognitive level and for difficulty and discrimination index.

Result show that 66.9% of the questions contained violations of item writing guidelines and79.1% were written at low cognitive levels. MCQs written at a low cognitive level were significantly more likely to contain item writing flows.47.3% of the questions had suitable discrimination index and 28.8% of the questions had suitable difficulty index. While there was no relationship between difficulty index and cognitive level, higher cognitive level and suitable discrimination index had significant relationship.

We should think about practically ways for using results of item analysis. Faculty members should be taught designing and using suitable questions and developing MCQs bank.