Available online at www.ijmrhs.com I n t e rn a t i o n a l J o u r n a l of M e d ic a l R e s e arc h & H e a l t h S c i e n c es • I J M R H S • International Journal of Medical Research & Health Sciences, 2020, 9(6): 72-78 72 ISSN No: 2319-5886 Role of Multiple Choice Questions in Assessment of Competency of Knowledge in Anatomy Itedal Abdelraheem Mohamed Ahmed* Human Anatomy, Health Professional Education, Department of Anatomy, College of Medicine, Najran University, KSA *Corresponding e-mail: itedalanatomy@gmail.com INTRODUCTION In professional exams, multiple-choice questions are used frequently to assess student knowledge in medical and other sciences. The precise, reliable, and timely assessment of students is an important domain of teaching during medical courses. The Multiple Choice Questions (MCQ) is one method assessment of students. Although it evaluates students cognitive knowledge but does not assess professional skills. Nevertheless, it is said that MCQs highlight recall of factual information rather than conceptual understanding and interpretation of concepts [1]. If the MCQs constructed professionally can assess higher cognitive processing of Bloom’s taxonomy such as interpretation, synthesis, and ap- plication of knowledge, instead of just testing recall of isolated facts [2,3]. Well-formulated MCQs assess cognitive, affective, and psychomotor domains, are preferred over other methods because they ensure objective assessment, the minimal effect of examiners bias, comparability, and cover a wide range of subjects [4]. Test with MCQ and analyzing their options have become the choice of many examiners in medical colleges [5]. Higher ordered thinking usually defned about the cognitive domain of Bloom’s Taxonomy. The frst levels, which are considered the lowest rank of thinking, include remembering and understanding while the rest of the four levels, which constitute the highest ranked thinking, including application, analysis and evaluation, and creation of knowl- edge in ascending order [6]. ABSTRACT Objectives: The main objective of the current study is to examine the items using the item analysis to assess their com- petency of knowledge in human anatomy. Methods: This is a quantitative descriptive cross-sectional study conducted at the Najran University faculty of Medicine, in the department of anatomy. A 31-second year MBBS students of level three took the multiple-choice question exam comprising 100 questions in one session. Each item was analyzed by item analysis. The planned period of data collection is the frst semester of the academic year 2019-2020. The data were analyzed using SPSS version 25, and Excel Software. All analyses were performed using the descriptive frequency, explore and correlation probabilities a p-value, p<0.01 (2-sided) was considered to indicate statistical signifcance. Results: The assessment of test items use the item analysis that is very diffcult question: 25; 25%, diffcult question: 8; 8%, average question: 46; 46%, easy questions; 9; 9% and very easy: 9; 9%. The discrimination indices, which are poor discrimination; 34; 34%, acceptable discrimination; 11; 11%,good discrimination; 6; 6%, very good discrimi- nation; 4; 4% and excellent discrimination; 45; 45%. The performance of students in this test showing that a large number of items have a role in distinguishing students knowledge in the anatomy test, but in Simple parts of the scale that the items did not succeed in assessing students. Items of anatomy exams displayed a strong relationship of dif- fculty (P) and discrimination (D) indices. Conclusion: The MCQs items assess their competency of knowledge in hu- man anatomy. The competence of students in the knowledge of anatomy measured at a high rate of A-type context-rich MCQs can be stem is case scenario, lead-in; question and options; distractors, and key. These items can differentiate good and poor accomplishment students.. Keywords: Item analysis, MCQ A-type, Diffculty index, Discrimination index, Distractor effectiveness, Correlation coeffcients