Worth a glance #11

Children are not to talk about the exam. Pearson again, and the business of testing for profit. I think there is moral hazard in spades here. As one commenter says: Whatever happened to Freedom of Speech? Oh, wait, it was sold to Pearson. I seem to remember being told that some publishers paid MRCP candidates if they could remember exam questions, so that they could be included in books they published. If you use MCQs, they will always leak. You need tens of thousands, and then you can flood the world with them. If you know the answer to say 10,000 dermatology undergraduate MCQs, you know dermatology. (Apart from that which you can’t test in an MCQ format.)

A sensible letter on MCQs in medicine (and other subjects). It is not what we do. Am I missing something?

Goodbye, SAT: How online courses will change college admissions. Not certain, but ideas welcome.

I suffer from the disease of being addicted to discussions about statistical inference. Probably because it is a part of the problem of why so much medical science is unreliable, and does not provide a good guide to action. But, it consumes so much CPU time that I need to get therapy. Great example here. After the first life time it may become second nature. Otherwise, by advice to the young is: start young, and clear your desk. Reading Stephen Senn is not compatible with a family life. I wish I had stopped with Gigerenzer and Royall. Having said that, as far as the clinic goes, I am all for the Adaptive Toolbox, which is how we practice, rather than profess, I think. Remember each day: I must wean myself off…..