Information for employers and other organisations
Licensing has important implications for doctors' employers and other organisations that contract or commission their services.
Employers must ensure through pre-employment and other regular checks that their doctors hold appropriate registration for the type of post or practice they have or will be undertaking. They must ensure that the doctors they employ or contract have a licence to practise if their work requires them to do so.
Employers can check the GMC status of doctors employed by their organisations by visiting the online Register (the List of Registered Medical Practitioners). This operates in real-time and will therefore always be up to date. Employers will be able to retrieve details for up to 10 doctors at a time and be able to distinguish between doctors who are:
- Registered with a licence to practise
- Registered without a licence to practise
Alternatively, users of the NHS Electronic Staff Record (ESR) and the Scottish Workforce Information Standard System (SWISS) may wish to use these systems to verify their doctors' GMC status.
LRMP download service
The GMC provides a data download facility. Organisations may wish to import the entire List of Registered Medical Practitioners into their existing systems as a means of checking a doctor’s GMC status. This may be of particular help to employers outside the NHS that deal with large numbers of doctors. The service provides a daily update file with all changes to the register. More information about this service can be found on our LRMP page.
Further information
Doctors' employers and other organisations can find further information about the licence to practise in a ‘resource pack’ produced by the GMC to help organisations ahead of the introduction of licensing on 16 November 2009.
The information in this pack gives more information about licensing and about changes to the online Register and some GMC certificates. The contents of the pack include a booklet, powerpoint presentation and FAQs and can be downloaded below: