Skip to content

The pack that cannot contradict itself

One reading of the exam, printed eight ways

StudyDrome Exam Manager generates eight kinds of exam-day documents from a published OSCE. One builder walks the exam once and hands the same payload to every document, so the station list, the doorway sheet, and the rotation timetable can never disagree about which station is number four.

Book a pilot

What is in the exam-day pack?

The pack comes from a published exam, from one screen. Open the exam's row, choose Exam Documents, and each one previews before you download it.

Document

What it carries

Station List

The circuit in rotation order, with totals.

Candidate List

Event, start station and start time per candidate.

Examiner List

Role and station allocations per examiner.

Examiner Checklists

Per-station candidate arrival order, with tick boxes.

Doorway Instructions

Station scenario sheets to post on the doors.

Rotation Timetable

A rotation-by-station grid with slot times per event.

SP Instruction Sheets

Per-station briefings for the simulated patients.

Observer Instruction Sheets

Per-station briefings for the observers.

Six of those are always there. The two briefing sheets appear only when the exam includes simulated patients or observers, so a circuit that uses neither is never offered an empty sheet to print.

Rest slots read "Rest Station" wherever they appear, and a slot with nobody in it reads "No Candidate". Slot times land on the timetable when the exam uses automatic timing.

Why can the documents not disagree?

Anyone who has run a circuit knows the failure. The timetable says station four. The door says station five. Thirty candidates are already in the corridor.

StudyDrome builds the entire pack in a single pass. A single builder walks the exam once. It reads the circuit, the events, the candidate roster, the examiner allocations, the rotation grids, the station scenarios and the staff briefings. Then it hands that one reading to every document.

Numbering comes from the same place. A candidate's number is their position on the roster and remains consistent across every sheet in the pack. A station's number is its position in the circuit, and that holds too.

So the station list, the doorway sheet, and the timetable cannot disagree about which station is number four. They are not three reports of the same exam. They are one reading of it, printed eight ways.

What warns you before you print?

The builder checks as it walks and tells you what it finds before you print anything.

What it says

What it means

"The exam has no stations configured."

There is no circuit to document yet.

"Event '{name}' has no date set — start times cannot be computed for it."

That event's grid will render without times.

"Event '{name}': multiple candidates share start station {n} — only the first is placed in the rotation grids."

Two people are booked into one starting position.

"{n} candidate(s) have no event or start station assigned and are excluded from the check lists and timetable."

Somebody is on the roster but not in the circuit.

The warnings arrive with the pack rather than instead of it. You still get your documents, and you get them with the understanding that some things are unfinished. Two days out, an exam office usually wants both.

Which documents come out as a spreadsheet?

Three documents are also available as spreadsheets: the station list, the candidate list, and the examiner list. Those are the flat, tabular ones, and a spreadsheet is what you do with them. Sort by station. Filter by event. Paste into a staffing rota.

The rest are PDFs, because that is what they are for. A doorway sheet is a page you pin to a door. An examiner checklist is a sheet somebody ticks. A rotation timetable is a grid you print once and put on the wall.

Each document downloads separately, so you print one role at a time. The person briefing simulated patients does not need the examiner allocations, and the runner posting scenarios does not need either.

What does the pack guarantee?

Exam day is the one part of the cycle you cannot redo. These are the properties the pack holds while you run it.

  • The pack is built from the published exam, so it describes the paper that will actually run.

  • One pass builds it all, so no two documents can disagree on a station or a candidate.

  • A candidate's number is their roster position, and it holds across every sheet in the pack.

  • The two staff briefing sheets appear when the exam has simulated patients or observers.

  • Warnings arrive with the pack, so you learn what is unfinished before you print rather than after.

  • The three tabular documents also export to a spreadsheet.

  • Each document downloads separately, so you print one role at a time.

Who needs the exam-day pack?

  • OSCE leads assembling a circuit two days before it runs.

  • Exam-day coordinators brief examiners, simulated patients, and observers separately.

  • Schools are running several events in one day, where each event needs its own grid.

  • Anyone who has printed a timetable that disagrees with the door.

Frequently asked questions

How are OSCE exam-day documents generated?

From the published exam, in one pass. Open the exam's row, choose Exam Documents, and a builder walks through the circuit, events, roster, and examiner allocations once. Every document is rendered from that single reading, and each previews on screen before you download it.

What is on a doorway instruction sheet?

The station's scenario is laid out as a page to post on the door. It is one of the three narrative documents, so it carries the station's own formatted text rather than a table. Candidates read it before they enter, and the copy inside the room matches, because both come from the same station record.

What happens if a candidate has no start station?

The pack still generates, and it tells you. A warning names how many candidates have no event or start station assigned, and says plainly that they are left out of the checklists and the timetable. You can fix the roster and regenerate it, or print it knowing exactly who is missing.

Can the exam-day documents be exported to Excel?

The three tabular ones can be: the station list, the candidate list, and the examiner list. Those are the documents you sort and filter, so a spreadsheet earns its place. The narrative sheets (doorway instructions, examiner checklists, briefings, and the timetable) are provided as PDFs because they are printed rather than manipulated.

What does an examiner get on the day?

On paper, a per-station checklist showing candidate arrival order with tick boxes, plus their own row on the examiner list giving role and station allocations. The scoring itself occurs in [the examiner app](/exam-manager/osce/examiner-app/), a separate screen built for a single station at a time.

Book a pilot

Bring last year's circuit: the stations, the events, the candidate list. We will publish it into a sandbox and print you the pack it produces.

Book a pilot

Related