WHY USE STANDARDIZED CLINICAL ENCOUNTERS?

For teaching clinical skills, standardized patients and practical instructors offer lively interactivity and
immediate feedback

• Interactive encounters
  with standardized
  patients promote the development and
  assessment of
  interpersonal and
  communication skills that are key to successful practice
• Standardized patients and practical instructors provide effective, interactive feedback at the end of the
  encounter when the learner is most receptive to
  instruction
• Participants can review videotapes of their encounters
  to gain insight into their interpersonal behavior and
  bedside manner
• Infrequent but important scenarios such as ethical
  dilemmas and medical emergencies can be practiced
  and discussed in a safe environment

For assessments of clinical competency, standardized clinical encounters provide
enhanced validity and reliability

• The scenarios closely simulate the actual conditions of practice, allowing construction of a highly valid and interpretable examination.
• A post-encounter checklist or rating scale completed
  by the standardized patient can reliably assess the
  learner's clinical interview, physical examination and interpersonal skills.
• The student's ability to recognize, interpret and apply
  the information they obtain can be evaluated by having
  the student complete a "patient findings questionnaire"
  after the encounter.
• Because of the consistent reproducibility of the
  stimulus presented by the standardized encounter,
  many persons can be confidently and reliably assessed
  on the same case, allowing direct comparison across individuals.