Study raises concerns over racial discrimination in MRCGP exam

Racial discrimination may be behind the high failure rate of UK ethnic minority doctors in the clinical skills part of the examination for membership of the Royal College of General Practitioners (MRCGP), researchers say after analysing two years of results.

The study of pass rates between 2010 and 2012, published in the BMJ, found that British doctors from ethnic minority groups were nearly four times as likely to fail the clinical skills assessment of the MRCGP exam at their first attempt as white UK candidates (17% versus 4.5%) (odds ratio 3.5 (95% confidence interval 2.7 to 4.6); P<0.001).1

In the clinical skills assessment, examiners observe a doctor’s clinical expertise in a range of scenarios from general practice in which actors play patients.

The difference between non-white …