Occupational English Test (OET in short) has always been the biggest hurdle on way to success for any healthcare professional who would like to practice in an English-speaking country like Australia. Of course, you, as a medical professional, may have all necessary qualifications and skills in order to play your role well but but still if you are the one who may not have command over English language, success in career can be hampered.
Understanding OET
Let us make a few things clear before we delve more into it. OET Exam will be for all medical professionals such as physicians, nurses, physiotherapists, radiologists and others. It is applicable for about 12 professions. And what is important is, it is all about English and nothing has to do with applicant’s medical knowledge. Yes, that is true.
Scenario
Consider this scenario, you are now taking OET Speaking Test. As you know, there will be role-plays. You will play your role and the examiner, the other speaker will play the role of the client, patient or a member of the family of the patient etc. You are first made understood what you are expected to do. You will receive a card with instructions. You will have to understand what you are asked to do and will have to play the role as suggested.
During conversation with the client, if you have suggested something that may not be right medically, it may not affect your score. For instance, if you are not able to diagnose the problem and provide the right solution or provide a solution that is known to be less effective in medical field, your score will not be lower down. But, when you speak with grammatical errors or with less confidence, the marks may get reduced. The overall essence of the matter is this: you will be judged not on the basis of what medical knowledge you possess but you will be judged only on the basis of the English you know.
If you can communicate well without hesitation, without any grammatical errors, you can scrape through it but if you can’t., you will miss out on the chance to score higher in your test.
Solution
●You will have to be confident and this confidence should be displayed when you speak to the examiner (the other role-player).
●It is not necessary that you should speak at length. You can structure your talk as needed. If the conversation is two-way, you can gain more time to frame your thoughts and speak much better.
●Remember, speaking fast might confuse your listener and moreover, this will also lead to misunderstanding of your attitude. Therefore, you will have to speak with considerable pauses (as needed) and with all clarity. Make sure your listener understand you well.
With OET Exam practice or preparation, you can make it much simpler for yourself to get through it.