CEM - Revalidation

Emergency Medicine Specialty Standards

Principles

The College has developed standards for all doctors practising within Emergency Medicine and identified a range of supporting information for revalidation.  The specialty standards are in line with the generic standards and criteria outlined in the GMC’s Framework for Appraisal and Assessment which is an adaptation of Good Medical Practice. The Specialist Standards Framework is designed to support doctors in the positive demonstration of their specialist practice.

Their purpose is to:

• Help doctors understand and prepare for their appraisal and revalidation

• Provide guidance for appraisers to discuss and consider the specialist practice of appraisees

• Assist the Responsible Officer and/or the College representative(s) in determining the revalidation recommendation of an individual doctor.

The specialty standards are set out in 3 columns; the first lists the GMC attributes of good medical practice, the second lists the standards for Emergency Medicine and the third lists the supporting information required.  The principles of the specialty standards correlate closely to the GMC’s Framework for Appraisal and Assessment and there is a bibliography listing the sources of supporting information for each standard, with particular reference to the Emergency Medicine curriculum. At the end of the standards documentation there is a detailed list of the potential supporting information that can be collected by an individual. It is highlighted that the supporting information collected for an individual is underpinned by that individual’s job plan.

The specialty standards and supporting information requirements have been developed from the Emergency Medicine Training Curriculum and existing College guidance on revalidation (2006) and guidelines for CPD (2006).

In defining the supporting information required for recertification the College’s aim has been to avoid duplicating the collection of data required for relicensing but to inform the revalidation process with additional material applicable to the standards. The College has defined core supporting information relevant to all Emergency Medicine physicians and additional supporting information for doctors performing specific roles (e.g. additional supporting information is required for doctors with management, teaching or research roles).

Development

The standards have been developed by the Revalidation subcommittee in conjunction with numerous other College committees. A survey of all Fellows was initially conducted to inform development of the draft standards (30% of Fellows responded). A consultation on the draft standards was conducted in the summer of 2009, which was open to all Fellows and Members of the College and the College Lay Advisory Group. In addition the Revalidation subcommittee is conducting a Delphi to achieve a consensus about the type of supporting information required for specialty standards. All Fellows and Members of the College were also asked to respond to the Academy consultation on the standards in September 2009.

The Colleges is proposing to undertake an annual review and update of those aspects of the process or standards that are identified as problematic or ambiguous in the early phase of revalidation.  In addition, the standards framework will be fully reviewed at a maximum 3 yearly interval to take into account any changes in the evidence base or new developments in specific methods or information gathered as a part of the revalidation process.

Sign-off

The specialist standards have been provisionally approved by the GMC, pending the findings from the GMC consultation on revalidation which is open until 4 June 2010. You can download the EM Standards below:
Emergency Medicine Specialist Standards for Revalidation

Next Steps

The Revalidation subcommittee is currently writing guidance for doctors to help with interpreting and applying the standards to their work.