RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Comparing performance among male and female candidates in sex-specific clinical knowledge in the MRCGP
JF British Journal of General Practice
JO Br J Gen Pract
FD British Journal of General Practice
SP e446
OP e450
DO 10.3399/bjgp12X649142
VO 62
IS 599
A1 A Niroshan Siriwardena
A1 Bill Irish
A1 Zahid B Asghar
A1 Hilton Dixon
A1 Paul Milne
A1 Catherine Neden
A1 Jo Richardson
A1 Carol Blow
YR 2012
UL http://bjgp.org/content/62/599/e446.abstract
AB Background Patients often seek doctors of the same sex, particularly for sex-specific complaints and also because of a perception that doctors have greater knowledge of complaints relating to their own sex. Few studies have investigated differences in knowledge by sex of candidate on sex-specific questions in medical examinations.Aim The aim was to compare the performance of males and females in sex-specific questions in a 200-item computer-based applied knowledge test for licensing UK GPs.Design and setting A cross-sectional design using routinely collected performance and demographic data from the first three versions of the Applied Knowledge Test, MRCGP, UK.Method Questions were classified as female specific, male specific, or sex neutral. The performance of males and females was analysed using multiple analysis of covariance after adjusting for sex-neutral score and demographic confounders.Results Data were included from 3627 candidates. After adjusting for sex-neutral score, age, time since qualification, year of speciality training, ethnicity, and country of primary medical qualification, there were differences in performance in sex-specific questions. Males performed worse than females on female-specific questions (–4.2%, 95% confidence interval [CI] = –5.7 to –2.6) but did not perform significantly better than females on male-specific questions (0.3%, 95% CI = –2.6 to 3.2%.Conclusion There was evidence of better performance by females in female-specific questions but this was small relative to the size of the test. Differential performance of males and females in sex-specific questions in a licensing examination may have implications for vocational and post-qualification general practice training.