Do they know too little? An inter-institutional study on the anatomical knowledge of upper-year medical students based on multiple choice questions of a progress test

In the progress test, on average only 29.9% of the students' answers were correct, reflecting that the performance was significantly below the expected standard. On the basis of the test results it remained unclear whether acquisition or retention of anatomical information was insufficient. Further evaluation by item characteristics revealed that the students had major difficulty in applying their theoretical knowledge to practical problems in the context of a clinical setting. Thus, our results reveal deficits in the anatomical knowledge of medical students in their final years. Therefore medical curricula should not only focus on enhancing the acquisition and retention of core anatomical knowledge, but aim at improving skills applying this in a clinical setting.