NMBA Outcomes-Based Assessment

Australia · Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia (NMBA), through AHPRA · licensing · secondary source

789practice questions from the subjects this exam covers
19subjects

Format

Two stages: a multiple-choice cognitive assessment, then a practical objective structured clinical examination. Stage one is multiple choice; stage two is a set of practical stations. The two stages are sat separately, stage two only after stage one is passed.

Sections

Over the years

The route by which internationally qualified nurses whose training is not assessed as substantially equivalent join the Australian register. It sits alongside, rather than replaces, the domestic degree route. Since 2020 the cognitive stage has been delivered as the NCLEX-RN, which is why the same examination appears twice in this library under two different regulators. Confirm the current paper against the regulator's own published specification before planning around it. This entry is compiled from published descriptions of the examination rather than from a specification document obtained from the examining body.

Official source: https://www.nursingmidwiferyboard.gov.au/

Subjects this exam draws on

Nursing Foundations I96 questionsNursing Foundations II91 questionsHealth Assessment and Physical Examination97 questionsClinical Skills and Procedures98 questionsMedication Administration and Safety87 questionsInfection Prevention and Control90 questionsFirst Aid and Basic Life Support86 questionsSociology for Nurses12 questionsCommunication and Therapeutic Relationships12 questionsMedical-Surgical Nursing I12 questionsMedical-Surgical Nursing II12 questionsEmergency and Trauma Nursing12 questionsMental Health Nursing I12 questionsMaternal and Obstetric Nursing12 questionsPaediatric Nursing (Child Health)12 questionsGeriatric Nursing (Care of Older Adults)12 questionsNursing Ethics and Law12 questionsPatient Safety and Quality Improvement12 questionsProfessional Practice and Registration12 questions

Five practice questions, worked

The questions are the end-of-manual checks written with each SUNYRA nursing manual. An examination's practice paper draws on the subjects that examination's published blueprint covers; the questions were written to the subject, not to the examination's own pattern, and none is a past paper.

1. A patient's sacral skin stays red when pressed rather than blanching. What does this indicate?

  1. Tissue damage has already begun
  2. Normal reactive redness that will fade
  3. A superficial reaction to bedding
  4. Dehydration affecting skin colour
Answer and working

A. Tissue damage has already begun

Skin that does not blanch and refill has already sustained damage, and it is the sign that precedes a visible break. On darker skin the redness may be invisible entirely, so the earlier signs are a patch that feels warmer, cooler, firmer or more painful than the skin around it — a system relying on seeing redness misses damage in dark-skinned patients systematically.

Nursing Foundations I · End-of-manual check

2. When should the position of a feeding tube be confirmed?

  1. Only after it is first inserted
  2. Once at the start of each shift
  3. Whenever the patient reports discomfort
  4. Before every feed, medicine and flush
Answer and working

D. Before every feed, medicine and flush

A tube that has moved delivers feed into a lung, which is among the most serious avoidable harms in ward nursing. Being correctly placed yesterday is not evidence about today, and coughing, vomiting or pulling at it are all reasons to check again.

Nursing Foundations II · End-of-manual check

3. Why does listening precede palpation in abdominal assessment, unlike elsewhere?

  1. Palpation is uncomfortable and should come last
  2. Pressing on the abdomen alters the bowel sounds
  3. Bowel sounds are loudest before the patient tenses
  4. It follows the same order used for the chest
Answer and working

B. Pressing on the abdomen alters the bowel sounds

Palpation stimulates the bowel and changes the sounds you are about to assess, so listening first is the only way to hear them undisturbed. The order everywhere else is look, feel, listen — the abdomen is the deliberate exception, and knowing why prevents it being forgotten.

Health Assessment and Physical Examination · End-of-manual check

4. How should a patient's identity be confirmed before a procedure?

  1. Ask them to state their own name and a second identifier
  2. Ask whether they are the named patient and check that they nod
  3. Check the bed number against the list
  4. Confirm with the nurse who admitted them
Answer and working

A. Ask them to state their own name and a second identifier

Asking whether somebody is Mr Singh invites a yes from a person who is unwell, hard of hearing or eager to co-operate. Open questions using two agreed identifiers are the standard, and bed numbers are not identifiers because patients move.

Clinical Skills and Procedures · End-of-manual check

5. A nurse is interrupted while drawing up an intravenous antibiotic. What is the safest action on returning to the task?

  1. Resume from the step they remember reaching
  2. Ask a colleague to confirm which step they were on
  3. Complete the preparation and double-check it afterwards
  4. Restart the check sequence from the prescription
Answer and working

D. Restart the check sequence from the prescription

An interruption empties working memory, so the step a nurse believes they reached is not reliably the step they actually reached — which is how doses get repeated or components omitted. Resuming from memory relies on exactly the faculty that was just disrupted. A colleague cannot know the step either. Checking afterwards cannot detect a component already added twice.

Medication Administration and Safety · End-of-manual check

Practise it, and prove it

These notes are free to read here, with no account.

What the Laisha app adds:

Free for ten days, then a subscription. We would rather write that here than have you find it later.

Open Laisha →