American Board of Surgery Qualifying Exam (ABS QE) Practice Test

Which score indicates that a patient is only able to produce sounds in the Verbal GCS?

1. 4

2. 2

3. 3

4. 1

The correct answer is: 2

The Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) assesses a patient's level of consciousness based on three components: eye opening, verbal response, and motor response. A score of 2 in the verbal component of the GCS indicates that the patient is making incomprehensible sounds but is not able to speak meaningful words. This means the patient does have some form of vocalization, but it lacks connection to coherent language, which places them in a position where only sound production is present without any proper verbal communication. In contrast, a higher score like 3 reflects the ability to utter inappropriate words, whereas a score of 4 represents a coherent conversation. A score of 1 indicates no verbal response whatsoever. Therefore, a score of 2 is appropriately interpreted as the patient being able to produce sounds, albeit non-verbal and without coherence.