Expectation

You may say: There may be a short painful teething period if we change the format of our examination, but in the long run we could have our students much more practical and put their attention on clinical medicine.

Yes, you're entirely right. (At the moment, I would take aside the pragmatic question on who is going to bear the responsibility of that painful period.)

But, let's face it: Do we really want to have practical and competent fresh medical graduates ?

"What a question !" I could hear you scream.

Alas, by we, I mean the government, the society, and the general public.

In that sense, the answer is NO. Competence is, at least, not necessary - and probably not desirable. We ask house officers to do copy-and-paste, blood-taking, and other donkey jobs - jobs that could be understood and mastered by the brain of a donkey. Look, we don't even ask them to know what's going on with their patients so that they could key in the discharge diagnosis.

(Oh, I am wrong. Those are not their patients; patients are owned by the hospital. House officers are visitors and have no right to take care of any patient. They are merely pairs of brainless hands.)

The only possible conclusion, therefore, is: We do not need to have competent graduates, and our professional examination does not need to have any practical relevance.

Alas, you think my words are difficult to swallow and I am too cynical ? As TS Eliot said, "Mankind cannot face too much reality."