American association for cancer education [2] had emphasized the role of structured educational programs for medical students and residents in primary care specialties in order to improve palliative oncology education. Dissatisfaction with the conventional methods of clinical assessment on the part of teachers and students led assessors to search for appropriate alternatives and in 1975, Harden and his colleagues introduced the objective structured clinical examination (OSCE). OSCE was introduced as a standardized tool for objectively assessing clinical competencies ­ including history­taking, physical examination, communication skills, data interpretation etc. It consists of a circuit of stations connected in series, with each station devoted to assessment of a particular competency using predetermined guidelines or checklists. The Structured Clinical Instruction Module (SCIM) modifies the Objective Structured Clinical Examination (OSCE) for teaching purposes. The objective of this review is to provide a focused update on the status and applicability of SCIM and OSCE in cancer for educational use in palliative care. From the 12 studies which were on OSCE and 6 studies which were on SCIM, it appears that the two competency­based evaluation methodologies used in cancer education namely the OSCE and SCIM, are well validated and reliably used across settings and samples of students, practitioners and patients. Future studies in Indian palliative care settings are warranted prior to extrapolation of existing evidence.

Keywords: Cancer Education; Structured Instruction; Clinical Skills; Objective Evaluation; Teaching­Learning.