The Use of Computers in Assessment of Medical Students

Abstract

The principal use of computing in medical examinations is in the marking of MCQ papers. The computing problems in this are relatively straightforward, and the major difficulty lies in producing answer sheets in machine-readable form. The three main systems, hole-poking card, mark-sense cards and mark-sense sheets are discussed and compared in some detail. The possible establishment of a central service which will undertake computer marking for Britain is discussed briefly. A short account is given of a marking system recently introduced in Glasgow.