evaluation of the nursing students’ skills by dops

background and purpose:  student assessment is an important issue in medical education. it is necessary to use objective, valid and reliable assessment methods that are appropriate to the learning objectives and domain.the objectives of this study were 1- development of the dops test (direct observation procedural skills) and identification of its validity, reliability and acceptability. 2- evaluation of the nursing students’ skills by the dops test. methods: first, the dops test was developed by reviewing the literatures and other related tools. its validity was determined by computing the content validity ratio (cvr) and content validity index (cvi), based on the experts’ panel opinions. then, the clinical skills of the students in doing special procedures were evaluated by the dops test. the cronbach alpha coefficient was used to determine the dops reliability. to explore the satisfaction with the dops test, a questionnaire and vas were used. results: based on the results, the dops test showed high content validity with cvr=1 and cvi=0.94. the reliability of the dops test confirmed α0.7. the respondents held a positive attitude toward the dops test with mean satisfaction greater than 8. the performance of the majority of students in doing special procedures was good based on the dops scores. conclusions: the dops test is a suitable evaluation method to assess the students’ procedural skills objectively because of its high validity, reliability and acceptability. to evaluate all aspects of the students’ performance the dops test should be combined with other clinical performance tests.