What happens in the APIE implementation station?

You carry out an intervention on the patient from your scenario, usually one that follows from the plan you wrote in the previous station. You are marked on safety, on the order you do things in, on what you say to the patient, and on recognising and escalating anything that changes.

Is the implementation station the same as a clinical skills station?

No, and the distinction matters. The four clinical skills stations are separate, performed on manikins and equipment, and are not part of the APIE. Implementation is the third APIE station and is carried out on the patient whose scenario runs through all four.

Should I talk through what I am doing?

Yes. Your checks, your reasoning and what you are watching for all have to be audible to be credited. It feels unnatural and it is what the station rewards.

Can I practise the implementation station here?

Yes. It is one of the four APIE stages the simulator carries, and the examiner in the room reports the outcome of what you do rather than leaving you guessing. Simulator attempts come with every access plan, 4 of them with the 99 days plan, which is a full APIE sitting, and in larger packs on their own. Our simulator covers assessment-style stations from the 10: you hold the conversation with a simulated patient by typing, and are marked against criteria we wrote ourselves. The four clinical skills stations are performed on manikins and equipment and are not simulated here. The result is a simulated verdict, not a prediction of how an NMC assessor would mark you.

The APIE implementation station

Written and checked against the NMC’s published sources by The NMCMATE editorial team.Last checked 1 September 2026.

Implementation is where the plan meets the patient. You are asked to carry out an intervention, usually one that follows from what you planned, and you are marked on doing it safely and in a sensible order as much as on doing it at all. The examiner is in the room and will tell you what happens as a result of what you do, so this is the station where saying what you are doing out loud stops being a habit and starts being how you score.

What is being watched

Checking the right patient, the right intervention and the right prescription before anything is given or done.
Explaining to the patient what you are about to do and getting their agreement, every time, not only the first time.
Doing it in a safe order, with hand hygiene and the equipment you need ready before you start rather than fetched halfway through.
Monitoring during and after, and saying what you are monitoring for rather than only that you are monitoring.
Recognising when something has changed and escalating it, instead of finishing the task first.
Recording what you did and what happened, at the time.

Where candidates come unstuck

Carrying out the task correctly in silence. If the examiner cannot hear your checks, they did not happen as far as the mark scheme is concerned.
Skipping the identity check because you assessed this same patient twenty minutes ago. It is checked every time, and its absence is a red flag rather than a lost mark.
Pushing on with the intervention after the patient reports something that should stop you.
Treating the examiner as scenery. They report what happens when you act, so a candidate who never asks gets no information back.
Leaving the documentation until the end and running out of time to do it.

Common questions

What happens in the APIE implementation station?: You carry out an intervention on the patient from your scenario, usually one that follows from the plan you wrote in the previous station. You are marked on safety, on the order you do things in, on what you say to the patient, and on recognising and escalating anything that changes.
Is the implementation station the same as a clinical skills station?: No, and the distinction matters. The four clinical skills stations are separate, performed on manikins and equipment, and are not part of the APIE. Implementation is the third APIE station and is carried out on the patient whose scenario runs through all four.
Should I talk through what I am doing?: Yes. Your checks, your reasoning and what you are watching for all have to be audible to be credited. It feels unnatural and it is what the station rewards.
Can I practise the implementation station here?: Yes. It is one of the four APIE stages the simulator carries, and the examiner in the room reports the outcome of what you do rather than leaving you guessing. Simulator attempts come with every access plan, 4 of them with the 99 days plan, which is a full APIE sitting, and in larger packs on their own. Our simulator covers assessment-style stations from the 10: you hold the conversation with a simulated patient by typing, and are marked against criteria we wrote ourselves. The four clinical skills stations are performed on manikins and equipment and are not simulated here. The result is a simulated verdict, not a prediction of how an NMC assessor would mark you.

Practise an assessment station

Talk to a simulated patient and get a marked report against the station criteria.

Simulator attempts come with every access plan, 4 of them with the 99 days plan, which is a full APIE sitting, and in larger packs on their own.

Stations are added and rewritten as the exam guidance changes, and every attempt runs against the current version, so a revision reaches your next station rather than a later edition of something you bought.

Watch a marked station See pricing

This page is one part of the exam. Work through the whole thing with the NMC OSCE pages.