Analysis of in Use Physiology MCQs: An Attempt to Assess the Assessment Tool

With increasing importance of multiple choice questions (MCQs) in medical examinations, this study was carried out to assess the quality of MCQs/items currently in use in physiology and discard the MCQs which are not found useful to prepare a valid question bank for future use using item analysis.

To assess the quality of MCQs/items currently in use in physiology to prepare a valid question bank.

An internal examination in physiology was conducted after 8 months of teaching in first-year MBBS which was attended by 150 students. Total 40 MCQs (items) and 120 distractors were analysed using difficulty index (P value), discrimination index (DI) and distracter efficiency (DE).

Data were entered in MS Excel 2007 and analysed. It is expressed as a percentage and mean plus or minus standard deviation of n items.

Mean P value was 58.85% and out of 40 items, 24 (60%) had ‘average’ P value (30–70%). Mean DI was poor (0.14) because of negative DI in 4 items and in that 18 (47.5%) items had ‘marginal to excellent’ DI (>0.15). Mean DE was 71.66%, considered as ideal/acceptable. There were 24 items with 34 (28.33%) non-functional distractors (NFDs), whereas 16 items did not have any NFD with mean DE of 100%. So, it is advisable to carry out item analysis after every assessment to develop valid and reliable question bank.