Development and application of an online testing system for clinical nurses

The online assessment is a new examination system which has a broad application in many research fields such as medical science and has been proved to be effective, reliable, and robust. The aim of this study was to establish an online testing system for clinical nurses and to assess its effectiveness compared with traditional paper-based tests in China. A randomized controlled trial was performed, a total of 1802 nurses were recruited and randomly assigned to take either the paper-formatted test or the online test. Then the paper quality, examinee's performance and nurses' assessments of online testing system were evaluated. The results shown that online assessment system for clinical nurses had a comparable examination effects with traditional paper-based format, and the nurse spoke highly of its effectiveness and efficiency. These data suggest that online nursing assessments should be considered a dependable replacement for paper test.