Assessing clinical reasoning in airway related cases among anesthesiology fellow residents using Script Concordance Test (SCT)

INTRODUCTION: Clinical reasoning is a core competency for physicians. In the field of anesthesia, many situations require residents to use their clinical reasoning to make quick and appropriate decisions such as during emergency airway cases. The Script Concordance Test (SCT) is a test developed in recent years and validated that objectively assess clinical reasoning ability. However, studies involving SCT to assess clinical reasoning in airway management is scarce. AIM: To evaluate SCT in assessing clinical reasoning for airway management in anesthesiology residents. METHOD: A cross-sectional study involving residents and anesthesiology consultants from the Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care, Faculty of Medicine Universitas Indonesia was conducted to complete SCT. A panel of five anesthesiology consultants with more than 15 years of work experience constructed 20 SCT vignettes based on prevalent airway cases in our center from the past 10 years. Each SCT has three nested questions, with a total of 60 questions, to be answered within 120 min. RESULTS: The SCT of 20 case vignettes with three nested questions were tested on 99 residents from the junior, intermediate, and senior residents, compared to answers from the expert group consisting of ten anesthesiology consultants with more than 5 years of experience. There were significant differences in mean SCT scores in the junior, intermediate, senior and expert groups, 59.3 (46.1–72.8), 64.7 (39.9–74.9), 67.5 (50.6–78.3), and 79.6 (78.4–84.8); p < 0,001 consecutively. Cronbach Alpha 0.69 was obtained, indicating good reliability. CONCLUSION: Our SCT was proven to be a valid and reliable test instrument to assess the clinical reasoning in airway management for anesthesiology residents. SCT was able to discriminate between groups of different clinical experiences and should be included to evaluate airway competencies in anesthesiology residents.