Residents Performance on the Mental Status Examination

Twenty-six residents watched a videotape of the mental status examination of a psychotic patient, then wrote their assessment of the patient's mental status. The residents’ reports were independently graded by the authors. The residents’ marks were compared to performance on departmental oral examinations. Results showed that global or qualitative assessment of mental status performance was reliable. Excellent inter-rater reliability was achieved when the assessment criteria for sub-items of the mental status were well defined.