The on-campus activities in this unit will help prepare you for subsequent units in your chiropractic degree. As such, you will receive ongoing feedback with the opportunity to work with the unit coordinator and/or tutors, as well as classmates, to develop your key chiropractic skills. 

Preparation, study and organisational skills are required of both successful students and chiropractic professionals throughout your career, therefore there will maybe tasks that you must complete BEFORE these on-campus activities are delivered. The weekly on-campus activities will vary in requirements and expectations. Each one will be based on material from the previous or current week's lectures.  It is essential that you review the material.

Activities will be reviewed/discussed in class thus providing feedback. You will be assessed on a pass/fail basis for the weekly activities. Each activity signed off on the on-campus activity form will be submitted to the tutor after the class.  At the conclusion of the term, students will be expected to have received a passing grade, in at least 8 weekly activities, in order to receive a 'pass' for this assessment overall.

In practice, the chiropractor is required to combine a variety of clinical skills; all these techniques must be mastered. The objective structured clinical exam (OSCE) in CHIR11001, is made of a single station (Mid-Term) to multiple stations (Final). Each station could require the student to complete or demonstrate appropriate consent, hygiene, professionalism and applying various technical aspects over a specified time period, including reading/planning time prior to the actual commencement of the assessment task(s). There will be a mid-term exam (week 6) as well as a final exam in week 12. The Mid-Term OSCE will have a value of 20% and the final practical test valued at 40%. The exact duration of each station will be determined and announced at a later date, but for the mid-term OSCE, the tasks should generally be completed within 4 minutes and the entire final OSCE should generally be 3-4 minutes per station.

Mid-Term OSCE - Week 6

Station 1: You will be required to perform tasks to demonstrate competence in performing a correct approach or technique, with appropriate patient handling.

1. Postural analysis (assessing 6 items as a minimum).

2. Spinal Range of Motion (ROM) assessment, using goniometer OR Extremity Range of Motion (ROM) assessment, using goniometer.

FINAL OSCE - Week 12

Station 1 Postural Analysis: You will be required to demonstrate competence in performing a correct approach or technique, with appropriate patient handling. 

1. You will be required to assess 10 items as a minimum of a mock patient postural evaluation.

Station 2 Spinal: You will be required to demonstrate competence in performing a correct approach or technique, with appropriate patient handling and being able to correlate your findings by sharing them with the examiner.

1. Location of specific spinal structures (bony landmarks).

2. Spinal Range of Motion assessment, using goniometer.

The tasks will be selected randomly according to a series of composed station cards.

Station 3 Peripheral: You will be required to demonstrate competence in performing a correct approach or technique, with appropriate patient handling and being able to correlate your findings by sharing them with the examiner.

1. Location of specific peripheral structures (bony landmarks).

2. Extremity Range of Motion assessment, using goniometer.

The tasks will be selected randomly according to a series of composed station cards.

Please note:

Each station is timed and you will have the set time to complete the station; therefore if a station is not completed within the allocated time, the practical element will be stopped and you will be marked based on your performance to that point.

The assessment will be recorded using a video camera to enable moderation, however, these recordings will not routinely be available for student feedback.  Direct feedback can be received from the unit coordinator or the tutors.

Mid-Term OSCE Assessment Criteria:

You will need to demonstrate basic competence in evaluating postural evaluation as well as spine and peripheral joint ranges of motion, using a goniometer.
Your performance will be graded, using a marking rubric, according to the following: introduction; inspection and postural analysis (viewed from two directions); active and passive ranges of motion (in all degrees of freedom) with demonstration of use of a goniometer on one active range of motion of your choice; patient handling; technical performance and the examiner's overall impression.

Final OSCE Assessment Criteria:

You will need to demonstrate basic competence in psychomotor skills expected at an introductory level in an applied context; evaluating postural evaluation as well as spine and peripheral joint ranges of motion, static palpation of spinal and peripheral bony landmarks and muscle surfaces.

Your performance will be graded, using a marking rubric, according to the following: introduction; inspection and postural analysis (viewed from two directions); active and passive ranges of motion (in all degrees of freedom); demonstration of a combination of eight (8) bony landmarks and surface muscle structures (both spinal and peripheral); patient handling; technical performance and the examiner's overall impression.