Eight weeks and counting ...!

The local ARCP panel is on Tuesday 14th June and that is only eight weeks away now. Nearly all our trainees will have their ePortfolio reviewed at this panel meeting and you need to have completed all the mandatory WPBA stuff by then. That means to have done all the necessary CBDs, miniCEXs, COTs, MSF, PSQs and got an up to date CSR and had a meeting with your educational supervisor.

If you have not already done it, now is the time to book an appointment with your educational supervisor. This wants doing the 3rd or 4th week of May by which time you will have completed everything and you will have no missing bits in your ePortfolio. Before your meeting with your educational supervisor you need to have completed the self rating competency scales - if you can't because you don't have a review date set then email your educational supervisor to set it up.

If you have not done it then your educational supervisor will not be able to complete his report and you will face the wrath of panel and a potential long, long walk to a Deanery panel in Leeds ....

DAAG Newsletter - highlights

We have all been circulated the latest DAAG Newsletter. Click here if you have not got it. The DAAG is the Deanery Assessment Advisory Group and advises the Deanery in agreement with the RCGP external assessors about best practice in assessment.

Highlights for me include:

• DOPS should not be carried out be peers - needs to be trained nurse or doctor
• Helpful suggestions to trainers about helping trainees pass AKT: start early, remember 50 mock questions on RCGP website, do Pearson Vue orientation first, you only have 54 seconds per question (!), do once and move on, remember DVLA, BNF tables etc etc and lots more
• Look at Bradford website for advice about finding ePortfolio evidence about competencies
• Use the ePortfolio as evidence of progress - harness it and protect yourself!

The latest DAAG newsletter demonstrates good practice in assessment that has been agreed between the Deanery and external advisers from the RCGP and contrary to widespread belief it has not just made up on the whim!

Proposed changes to Medical Education and Training - they are daft!

Alongside the large changes in NHS commission and the end of PCTs and SHAs you might not have noticed that Deaneries are also planned to be scrapped. The government has published a white paper 'Liberating the NHS:Developing the Healthcare Workforce' where it talks about setting up local skills networks which will commission and provide education and training.

Their proposals however are very unclear. What is so bad about the current system? What will be the size of these skills networks? What is the evidence that replacing a large system that attempts to deal with workforce planning issues be improved by replacing them with smaller networks? What is to reduce the threat that large foundation trusts will dominate these networks and use their power to create training jobs to staff EWTD rotas rather than meet and increasing need for GPs in a 'GP led NHS'?

The RCGP has published its response to the consultation - click here to download the pdf of what they have send to the Department of Health.

It is impossible to find an answer to my questions in the document and the proposals are unjustified, unclear and if carried out will seriously damage Medical Education and Training!