OET study and take the Occupational English Test at LSI Portsmouth

OET is the Occupational English Test. Lewis here explains what it is and who it is for and how to take it:

So my name is Lewis Richards and I'm the Director of Studies for Exam classes at LSI Portsmouth. (OET - What is it?). The OET stands for the Occupational English Test and it's an English exam that's designed for medical professionals so; doctors, nurses and so on, to prove their English level mainly so that they can work in English speaking countries as doctors or nurses.
(And who is it for?) So it's aimed at people who are already qualified as.., we're going to be running courses for nurses, but there are 12 different versions of OET there's doctors, dentists, nurses and so on. So people who are already qualified as nurses for example but need to get proof that their English is good enough to work with patients in English speaking countries.
(At the moment what do they do?) So at the moment most people who are in this situation take an IELTS exam which is fine and you can still do that but the difference really is that IELTS is an exam that is taken by anybody who wants to prove their English level for studying for work, it's not specifically medically related and the OET is specifically related to medicine, so, for example when you are doing the reading test of OET the texts are medical articles, patient notes things like that. The speaking test for OET is two role plays where you're roleplaying with an interlocutor who is a patient so you are doing what you would do if you were actually doing the job so it’s very specific to medicine that's the difference. (And you said that it's marked slightly differently) Yeah so the interesting thing is that in the speaking test particularly, you're marked in two ways, one is the normal way; your grammar and vocabulary, your pronunciation but you are also marked on your communication skills so your ability to have empathy for the patients, for example, to listen to them. Those kind of soft skills that you would really need when you are working with real patients are also tested which I think is great. (And how is LSI getting involved in this?) So LSI has just become an official OET test centre, and actually we are the only test centre in this area in the south of England. We're gonna have our first test on March the 16th and we are also going to run courses and we're going to run one week intensive OET preparation courses, so a 25 hour crash intensive course the week before each test so you come and study from Monday to Friday intensively to prepare for the exam and you do your exam on Saturday. We have 14 test dates, I think there's 14 test dates per year and we'll have a course that runs for a week before each one. (And if you want more information?) Have a look on our website, we have an OET test page and an OET page for the courses. (Lovely, thank you very much) Thank you.