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Rheumatology 2003; 42: 1421
© 2003 British Society for Rheumatology

Letter to the Editor

The GALS examination

A. S. M. Jawad and B. L. Kidd

Royal London Hospital, Bancroft Rd, London E1 4DG and Barts & The London, Queen Mary School of Medicine and Dentistry, London E1 2AD, UK

Correspondence to: A. S. M. Jawad, The Royal London Hospital, Bancroft Road, London E1 4DG, UK. E-mail: alismjawad1{at}hotmail.com

We agree with Walker and Kay that the GALS (gait, arms, legs and spine) screening examination represents a major advance for undergraduate education by enabling medical students to perform a validated, straightforward musculoskeletal examination [1]. We are disappointed however, that GALS has not been more widely adopted by the postgraduate community. Whilst our rheumatological colleagues recognize GALS, little or no awareness of it was found among general practitioners and orthopaedic surgeons in an informal survey in East London.

In order to overcome this, we feel that descriptions of GALS need to find their way into the standard textbooks of medicine and their clinical examination supplements. Dialogue to ensure wider acceptance of the examination should take place between sponsors of GALS, the British Orthopaedic Association and representatives of primary care societies. On a practical level, we make the GALS examination part of our pre-registration house officer induction by showing a descriptive video in February and August to all appointees. Once the CD-ROM version becomes available, we intend to place copies on the trust intranet. We suggest to the Arthritis Research Campaign that copies of the video (currently not available) are produced and circulated to all clinical tutors in the UK, to be shown during induction or as part of an ongoing education programme.

References

  1. Walker DJ, Kay LJ. Musculoskeletal examination for medical students: the need to agree what we teach. Rheumatology 2002;41:1221–3[Free Full Text]
Accepted 5 March 2003


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This Article
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