Safety recommendation
HSIB recommends that the General Medical Council, supported by the Medical Schools Council, revises ‘Achieving good medical practice’ to include guidance for medical students on how to handle uncertainty in clinical settings, including challenging a culture, or an expectation, that a learner undertake unfamiliar tasks to gain competencies without appropriate supervision or support.
Response:
A new version of Good medical practice (2013), which describes the professional behaviours expected of all doctors registered with the GMC, is to be published imminently. This will enable us, in conjunction with the Medical Schools Council (MSC), to begin our review of Achieving good medical practice: guidance for medical students (2016), which shows how the principles and values of Good medical practice apply to medical students. Through this work we will determine how best to include the type of guidance specified in this safety recommendation.
We have sent a letter (15 May 2023) to the deans of all UK medical schools, co-signed by the Medical Schools Council, setting out our plan to have updated this document and implemented this safety recommendation by the end of Quarter 1 2024.
This letter also outlined plans to use the quality assurance self-assessment questionnaires medical schools complete annually to explore questions in relation to the safeguards that are in place for medical students on clinical placements.
We will also use the next medical student professionalism competition, which we run with the MSC, to focus on the importance of learners always working within their competence. This will promote awareness of this issue.
Actions planned to deliver safety recommendation:
- GMC and MSC to review Achieving good medical practice: guidance for medical students, by August 2023 - April 2024.
- GMC to publish updated Achieving good medical practice: guidance for medical students, by April 2024.
- The GMC and MSC will run the next student professionalism competition on topic of students working within their competence, by June - October 2023.
- The GMC will explore questions around safeguards for medical students on clinical placements through annual quality assurance self-assessment questionnaires, by October 2023 - December 2024.
Response received on 23 June 2023.