General Medical Council

Carrie, Colin, Charlie, Una and Robert from our senior leadership team kicked this week off with an insightful trip to Northern Ireland, connecting with healthcare leaders, doctors, medical students and Physician Associates (PAs). Monday started with an inspiring tour of Ulster University’s Postgraduate Medical School, led by their brilliant team! The medical school organised a fantastic question and answer session, where everyone had the opportunity to ask us about various areas of our work. That evening, our leadership team attended a forum with healthcare leaders from Northern Ireland, gaining valuable insights on the latest challenges and innovations in the country's health system. Tuesday saw us visit the Medical and Dental Education Centre at the Western Health and Social Care Trust. Guided by the trust's senior management, we explored their state-of-the-art facilities and met with staff across various departments, gaining a deeper appreciation for the incredible work taking place there. These two days were packed with learning, collaboration and meaningful exchanges - leaving our senior leadership and dedicated Northern Ireland office with lots of insights and key takeaways for the future.

A huge welcome to this year's cohort of clinical fellows, who recently started their 12-month placements with us across a range of our departments. Pictured are Dr. Myranda Attard, Dr. Alan Abraham and Dr. Zeinab Ibrahim-Hashi, who join us along with Dr. Anna King and Dr. Aishvarya Gupta. Clinical fellows are doctors who choose to participate in dedicated out-of-programme placements to gain experience in national NHS and healthcare-related organisations – a scheme we have been participating in since 2011. With them, they bring valuable perspectives from recent frontline experience in healthcare, helping us to gain more insight into the working lives of doctors. In return, they're able to develop their leadership skills and learn more about our role.

Have you visited our ethical hub recently? We've made a few updates to the section on treating older adults, including more information on age discrimination, continuity of care and frailty. Take a look and refresh your knowledge https://lnkd.in/eCSb_cHd

A huge thank you to our Black and minority ethnic (BME) staff network for organising a incredible series of #BlackHistoryMonth events, and to all the speakers who took time out of their diaries to speak to our colleagues. The events wrapped up yesterday with an inspiring discussion on reclaiming narratives in healthcare, featuring Dr. Harleen Johal from Black and Brown in Bioethics, Dr. Naomi Ehigie from Melanin Medics, and Dr. Monique Wheatle from African Caribbean Medical Mentors. Each shared insights on their work to address healthcare inequities and highlighted the importance of elevating the voices and experiences of ethnic minorities working in healthcare. Earlier in the month, we were lucky enough to welcome back former colleague and author Kabir Kareem Belo who read from his novel The Street Hawker's Apprentice, the latest selection for our BME network's book club. Kabir also shared insights about his personal story, recalling the culture shocks he encountered when he moved to the UK from Ibadan in Nigeria as a child. A great month of celebrating, learning, and reflecting 👏

We’ve recently updated one of our most important pieces of guidance for #MedicalStudents, Achieving good medical practice. Co-produced with the Medical Schools Council, it demonstrates how the principles and values of Good medical practice – the professional standards that set out the care and behaviour expected of all doctors registered with us – apply to students both now and in their future career. Scroll through our slides to learn more about the guidance. You can also access it in full on our website https://lnkd.in/gjHyAbsJ

Being investigated fairly at a local level has not been the experience of a significant number of doctors. Our Employer liaison advisers (ELAs) are working with Responsible Officers (ROs) and other senior staff to try and change this.      We’ve developed training for our ELAs that supports them to talk to ROs about the impartiality of referrals at an earlier stage. The training emphasises the importance of understanding cultural differences, expectations, and language nuances.    We’ve also been running a series of workshops for ELAs to better understand what impartiality looks like in practice, and to consider the role of bias – our own and others – and how to tackle it.    We’re now seeing the positive effect of our collaborative work. Analysis of referrals in 2023 shows an increase in ROs stating they have undertaken an impartiality check, a reduction in international medical graduate referrals and a reduction in ROs relying solely on their ELA for an assessment of fairness.     You can read more about the work of our Employer liaison service in our blog from Antony Americano https://lnkd.in/e3_uRaXe #SupportingDoctors #WorkplaceEquality #InclusiveHealthcare

This new research highlights that doctors across the UK are embracing artificial intelligence in their practice. We recently created a resource to help doctors navigate innovative tech with confidence, all while keeping patient safety at the forefront. Take a look at our webpage for more information https://lnkd.in/ehjWYNue

We have written to #PhysicianAssociate (PA) and #AnaesthesiaAssociate (AA) employers to update them on our plans for when registration begins in December 2024. Read the open letter on our website https://t.co/omwIzXYAH1 It highlights: – How and when PAs and AAs should apply for registration depending on whether they’re on the relevant voluntary register or not – That we welcome their support in encouraging PAs and AAs to apply at their earliest opportunity when regulation begins – Our expectations for employers and their role in supporting PAs and AAs during the process. Regulation is a vital step towards strengthening patient safety and provides assurance that PAs and AAs have the right level of education and training, meet our standards and will be held to account if serious concerns are raised. We’ll continue to keep employers and other stakeholders updated on our progress in the lead-up to regulation. 

Setting up a mentoring scheme comes with many questions 🤔   Fortunately, Dr. Eliza Lewington-Gower's mentoring toolkit has the answers. Created during her time as a Marx Clinical Fellow with us, this toolkit is designed to help training and healthcare organisations establish formal mentoring programmes https://lnkd.in/euuwC4Xg   In her blog, written specially for #NationalMentoringDay yesterday, Dr. Lewington-Gower explains how having a mentor during her time with us - something she hadn't had throughout her medical career - inspired her to create this toolkit. She also explores how formal mentoring programmes can help address disparities in mentorship access, particularly those from ethnic minority backgrounds or who completed their medical training abroad.   Read Eliza's blog on the importance of #mentoring https://lnkd.in/ewdRPb8d.

Congratulations to Tista Chakravarty-Gannon, our Head of Outreach Operations, on receiving the President’s Award at the British International Doctors Association National Conference last Saturday.   Tista was recognised for leading her team's work on Equality, diversity and inclusion (ED&I) - you can read the latest on that part of our wider ED&I programme in our recently published report https://lnkd.in/eZDv9nti. Tista was also recognised for her role in helping to implement the updated version of Good medical practice, and strengthening the induction programme for International medical graduates (IMGs) entering the UK. She spoke about these three topics in a speech after receiving the award.    You can read more about our work to help improve induction programmes for IMGs in our latest blog, from Tista herself! https://lnkd.in/edemX33D #InternationalMedicalGraduates #InclusivityMatters