Pass the PSA, 1e

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Your revision should be done through understanding rather than memorising. For every fact you come across, try to either seek an explanation or come up with your own explanation. Even a wrong explanation is usually alright as the PSA won't test on the explanation. This helps you remember the fact much better compared to simply memorising. Foundation doctors are expected to prescribe very frequently, and it is essential to patient well-being that they do so appropriately and safely. National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence. Colorectal cancer: the diagnosis and management of colorectal cancer CG131. London: National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence 2010. Delivered jointly by the British Pharmacological Society and the MSC Assessment, the PSA is an online exam designed to assess your knowledge, skills and judgement of prescribing medicines within the context of the NHS. This includes writing, reviewing and amending prescriptions, calculating drug doses, and identifying adverse drug reactions and medication errors.

There is an element of judgement of which is most important, if several pieces of information are accurate. Typically, you will be provided with 5 options and tasked with deciding which treatment would be most appropriate in the management of the given clinical scenario. Know how to prescribe gentamicin and how to use the gentamicin chart to determine next prescription timing The Geeky Medics P rescribing Safety Assessment (PSA) Question Bank contains over 500 prescribing questions. It has been crafted to accurately reflect the style and format of the prescribing safety assessment, with all questions adhering to official PSA guidelines.You have to choose the most appropriate answer from the 5 choices of answers, using your clinical knowledge and judgement. The BNF may be able to help, but only in some cases. For questions about the monitoring for beneficial effects, you need to use your clinical knowledge and judgement to determine to most appropriate monitoring option. The information about that is not usually available in the BNF. The treatment summaries can help in this section if you are not sure what drug should be used. However, having a good basic understanding of most conditions allows you to focus on looking up the appropriate drug based on your prior understanding which helps save time. Data interpretation made memorable and simple including ECG, ABGs, chest X-rays and basic bloods. Common traps highlighted throughout.

Get ahead! The Prescribing Safety Assessment’ by Muneeb Choudhry, Nicholas Rubek Fuggle and Amar IqbalFor pharmacological management, the dose, route of administration, frequency and duration of each drug in the choices of answers may or may not be correct, so you need to think about them as well. These information are available in the BNF, though not usually for fluid management. Even if among the 5 choices there is only one drug with one dose, route, frequency and duration, do not assume that everything is correct for that drug.

The question may ask you what is the monitoring required before starting the drug or how to monitor for beneficial effects or adverse effects after starting the drug. There is a 'Monitoring requirements' section in the BNF for many drugs. The information under that section is often the answer for questions about the monitoring required before prescribing a drug as well as questions about the monitoring for adverse effects. However, research indicates that newly-qualified doctors find prescribing particularly challenging, and the EQUIP study identified errors in 8.4% of the 50016 prescriptions written by FY1 doctors it reviewed in 2009. With the exception of the Prescribing and Prescription Review sections, each question in all other sections carries 2 marks. A correct answer scores 2 marks while an incorrect answer scores 0 mark, there is no in-between.

If the peak concentration of a drug is outside normal range, you should adjust the dose. If the trough concentration is outside normal range, you should adjust the interval between doses.

This is great! Thank you. Under the ‘Prescription Review’ section, you mentioned that there are tables of ‘drugs that cause……’ I cannot seem to find these anywhere. Would you be kind enough to clarify how I can find these tables?

You might also be interested in our Prescribing Safety Assessment Question Bank which contains over 500 prescribing questions. The aim is to assess the outcomes required of newly qualified doctors in Outcomes for graduates (originally published in Tomorrow's Doctors) as they relate to prescribing. The content of each question is relevant to the prescribing tasks expected of a Foundation Year 1 doctor as outlined in Tomorrow's Doctors 2009, so the questions refer to ailments and drugs that students are likely to be dealing with in Foundation Year 1. Students taking the test can refer to the content of the online British National Formulary at any point during the assessment. While the BNF is a recommended resource, it is important to understand it does not answer all questions on prescribing. The PSA is based on the competencies identified in the General Medical Council’s Outcomes for graduates (originally published in Tomorrow’s Doctors), such as writing new prescriptions, reviewing existing prescriptions, calculating drug doses, identifying and avoiding both adverse drug reactions and medication errors and amending prescribing to suit individual patient circumstances. The eight distinct prescribing areas: prescribing, prescription review, planning management, providing information about medicines, calculation, adverse drug reactions, drug monitoring and data interpretation, are delivered over two hours. The content of each question refers to ailments and drugs you are likely to encounter in year one of the Foundation Programme. In some cases, a particular drug may be very helpful or important in the management of the diagnosed condition, but it does not help in achieving the effect that the question specifically asks for. Do not prescribe such a drug, otherwise you may score 0 mark for the whole question. Sp aced repetition is a technique for improving the retention of information . It works by spacing out the intervals between review sessions . This spacing allows you to consolidate the information making it more likely you will recall it during the prescribing safety assessment.