James Fraser¹
1 Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine 

The Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine (ACRRM) was established in 1999 and is one of two colleges that provide General Practice training in Australia. ACRRM Fellows complete a four year rural generalist training program that equips them with the knowledge, primary care and advanced skills to provide patient care in rural and remote Australia. Graduates are Rural Generalists, who are formally recognised as specialist practitioners providing a combination of extended general practice and additional expertise in a sub- specialty that rural communities need but cannot support in a full-time sub-specialist roster. 

The ACRRM Fellowship assessment program has a programmatic design that is wholly delivered remotely. The assessment program utilises a variety of modalities including Multiple Choice Questions, Multi Source Feedback, mini-CEX, Case Based Discussions and a procedural logbook. ACRRM pioneered the development of a remotely-delivered, multi- station clinical assessment in 2008 and have run this once or twice yearly since (Sen Gupta et al, 2021). This assessment method, known as Structured Assessment of Multiple Patient Scenarios (StAMPS), consists of 8 ‘stations’ where candidates explore standardised clinical scenarios and respond to a number of questions by a sole examiner, with limited prompting. These scenarios are set in a standardized hypothetical location, “Stampsville” which has a defined community profile. The content of the assessments is developed by practicing rural generalists and focusses on assessing clinical practice in authentic rural environments. 

The remote delivery of all assessment removes the need for trainees and examiners to travel to large regional towns or major cities to sit assessment thus avoiding removing them from the medical workforce of their hometowns. This presentation will discuss the ACRRM assessment program with focus on the processes supporting remote delivery. 

References (maximum three) 

Smith JD and Hays RB. Is rural medical practice a separate discipline? Australian Journal of Rural Health, 2004; 12: 67-72. 

Sen Gupta T, Campbell D, Chater AB et al. Fellowship of the Australian College of Rural & Remote Medicine (FACRRM) Assessment: a review of the first 12 years [version 1] MedEdPublish 2020, 9:100 https://doi.org/10.15694/mep.2020.000100.1 

Sen Gupta, Tarun, Wong E, Doshi D, Hays RB. . "'Stability' of Assessment: Extending the Utility Equation." MedEdPublish 10 (2021).