| Sumario: | Introduction: Medical students at the University of Malaya (UM) sit for professional examinations at the end of each phase. The purpose of this study was to examine if students' performance in the earlier professional examinations (Phase 1, Phase 2 and Phase 3A) could predict their performance in the final professional examination or Exit Examination (Phase 3B). Methods: The study population comprised three cohorts of medical undergraduates in UM. For each cohort, retrospective analyses of students' performance in the four professional examinations were conducted using stepwise multiple regression analysis. In the regression analysis, students' Phase 3B score was the dependent/criterion variable while Phase 1, Phase 2 and Phase 3A scores were the independent/predictor variables. All the variables were continuous variables. Results: For Cohort 2006/2011, stepwise multiple regression gave a regression model with a good fit: R² = 0.681, R²adjusted = 0.679, [F (1, 172) = 367.355, p < 0.001). Phase 3A score, which explained 68.1% of the variance, was the only significant predictor of students performance in the Exit Examination. The regression models for Cohort 2007 / 2012 and Cohort 2008 / 2013 were also good fit: with R² = 0.614, RR²adjusted = 0.611, [F (1, 163) = 258.875, p < 0.001] and R² = 0.572, R²adjusted = 0.570, [F (1, 172) = 230.029, p < 0.001] respectively.
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