MSK & orthopaedics · Examination

Low back pain with left leg pain after lifting - GP

MediumYear 5 · Curtin style · 10 min + 2 min reading · 3 tasks

2 min reading · 10 min station · reminders at 2 min

Station - Instructions for candidate

You are a final-year medical student on placement in a general practice in Mount Pleasant.

Kosta Georgiou, a 42-year-old double bass player, was well until nine days ago, when he felt a sudden twist in his lower back while lifting an amplifier; pain then ran down his left leg. He is in the consulting room for you to assess.

Your tasks are to:

  1. Perform a focused examination.
  2. Summarise your findings to the examiner with your provisional diagnosis.
  3. Outline your initial management plan to the examiner.
  • You do NOT need to take a formal history; brief questions relevant to the examination are fine.
  • Please verbalise your examination to the examiner; findings will be provided on request.

This is a 10-minute station, with 2 minutes of reading time.

Ask the examiner

Say what you would examine or request, the way you would in the station. Nothing is named until you ask for it.

Whatever the examiner recognises is revealed below. Or pick a numbered item to reveal it blind.

Investigations

Ask for a category the way you would in the station: “Can I have the obs and a set of bloods?”

Examination

Say what you would examine and how; the examiner reports what you would find.