FAQs - Methods and supporting information for revalidation
Last updated: 1 March 2010
Questions on this page
- 1. Will I have to pass an examination in order to revalidate?
- 2. I have no medical practice of any kind and therefore cannot draw on evidence of actual practice. How do I revalidate?
- 3. Will my employer's existing appraisal process satisfy the requirements for revalidation?
- 4. Must my appraiser be medically qualified and work in my specialty?
- 5. I am self-employed, I work wholly outside the NHS and there is no local process through which I can be appraised. Will I be able to access an appraiser and Responsible Officer provided by my College/Faculty?
- 6. I keep hearing about multi-source feedback from patients and colleagues being part of the requirements for revalidation. Will the GMC organise this for me?
- 7. How often do I need to participate in colleague and patient questionnaires for revalidation?
- 8. Can I begin using the colleague and patient questionnaires on the GMC website in my current appraisal?
- 9. I am developing colleague and patient questionnaires for use in revalidation. What are the requirements that questionnaires have to meet? Will there be any guidance available?
- 10. How many hours Continuing Professional Development (CPD) will I need to complete in order to revalidate?
- 11. What is the minimum number of clinical sessions that I would need to work in order to revalidate?
More information can be found on our revalidation page.
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1. Will I have to pass an examination in order to revalidate?
For practising doctors, this is very unlikely. That is because revalidation is about what doctors do in their actual practice. In most cases, an examination would not tell us about this. Some specialties are proposing to use on-line open book knowledge assessments as part of Continuing Professional Development (CPD) and this would contribute to the supporting information for revalidation, but no one is proposing a formal revalidation examination for practising doctors.
Instead, revalidation will be based on annual appraisal in the workplace. It will require you to show, within the context of your practice, that you are meeting the appropriate professional standards.
2. I have no medical practice of any kind and therefore cannot draw on evidence of actual practice. How do I revalidate?
If you are not involved in any form of medical practice, there is no need for you to retain a licence to practise. If you do not have a licence, you will not need to revalidate.
However, if you have no medical practice of any kind (either clinical or non-clinical), and still wish to maintain a licence, an objective evaluation such as an examination incorporating a knowledge and skills test may be the only practical way for you to demonstrate you are up to date and fit to practise. In these circumstances, success in one of the following examinations will enable you to revalidate:
a. The Professional and Linguistic Assessments Board (PLAB) test or any postgraduate qualification currently accepted by the GMC for the purposes of full registration.
b. Successful completion of the knowledge and skills assessments developed for the GMC performance procedures.
3. Will my employer's existing appraisal process satisfy the requirements for revalidation?
Your annual appraisal will be the main way in which you will demonstrate that you are meeting the standards required for revalidation. We know, however, that the quality of appraisal in different parts of the UK is, at present, patchy. In many cases, employer appraisal systems will need to work more effectively. Work on this is underway. We will not start revalidating doctors until we are confident that appropriate systems are in place. For information on how we propose to roll out revalidation gradually as systems become robust enough to support it, see our frequently asked questions about the timetable for and roll-out of licensing and revalidation.
The GMC has developed a Good Medical Practice (GMP) Framework for appraisal and assessment which will support the delivery of revalidation. The framework sets out generic standards of practice which all doctors will need to meet. The Framework has been used by the medical Royal Colleges and Faculties as the basis for the development of specialty-specific standards frameworks for revalidation. The GMP Framework is now being incorporated into strengthened systems of appraisal so that when you come to revalidate you will be able to use your appraisal to demonstrate that you are meeting the required standards. The GMP Framework is provided in Annex 1 and the specialty standards frameworks are available in Annex 2 of the consultation document.
4. Must my appraiser be medically qualified and work in my specialty?
The NHS Revalidation Support Team in England is currently reviewing its guidance on medical appraisal. This states that to improve, challenge and facilitate evaluation, the appraiser should be familiar with the role and working environment of the appraisee. For specialists and GPs this will usually mean that the appraiser is from the same specialty, but not necessarily from the same sub-specialty as the appraisee. Whether or not this is the case, the GMC will require the arrangements to be appropriately quality assured.
5. I am self-employed, I work wholly outside the NHS and there is no local process through which I can be appraised. Will I be able to access an appraiser and Responsible Officer provided by my College/Faculty?
Some Faculties and independent doctor organisations already provide appraisal facilities for their members who do not have access to local arrangements. To meet the requirements of revalidation, any appraisal service offered by your Faculty, or by another agency, will need to incorporate the Good Medical Practice Framework for appraisal and assessment and be appropriately quality assured.
Eligibility to fulfil the Responsible Officer role is not a matter for the GMC. This will be determined by legislation and guidance produced by the health departments in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. However, we expect that the legislation will provide for many non-NHS organisations and some Faculties to appoint Responsible Officers. These are likely to include the Faculty of Occupational Medicine, the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine and the Faculty of Public Health on the grounds that doctors in these specialties often work in situations where those employing or contracting their services would be unable to provide a Responsible Officer role to assist in their revalidation.
6. I keep hearing about multi-source feedback from patients and colleagues as being part of the requirements for revalidation. Will the GMC organise this for me?
Feedback from colleagues and patients (where relevant - some doctors do not see patients) represents useful supporting information that will enable doctors to demonstrate that they meet the standards for revalidation. This information is likely to be considered at a doctor's annual appraisal along with other information about a doctor's performance, drawn largely from their practice. The outputs of appraisal and other collated information will subsequently lead to a revalidation recommendation about the doctor to the GMC from the Responsible Officer in their healthcare organisation. For more information on how revalidation will work, see the FAQs on general questions about revalidation.
Colleague and patient feedback questionnaires will not be organised by the GMC but through the doctor's workplace.
It will not be mandatory to use GMC questionnaires for obtaining feedback from patients and colleagues. However, it is important that any colleague and patient questionnaires used to support a doctor's revalidation are robust, valid and reliable. We have therefore developed a set of principles and criteria which we think any colleague and patient questionnaires should meet for the purposes of revalidation.
We also plan to put in place arrangements for accrediting those questionnaires that satisfy the principles and criteria we have set. This will enable doctors, and healthcare organisations purchasing colleague and patient questionnaires, to be confident that they are fit for purpose. More information about the principles and criteria, and about our plans for accrediting colleague and patient questionnaires, is contained in Section 3 of this consultation document.
7. How often do I need to participate in colleague and patient questionnaires for revalidation?
Doctors should participate in colleague and patient (where appropriate) questionnaires at least once in every five-year revalidation cycle. There should also be provision for a doctor to obtain further feedback within that revalidation cycle if concerns are identified in the first colleague and patient questionnaires. We do not envisage that doctors will need to provide information about participation in colleague and patient questionnaires at each annual appraisal.
8. Can I begin using the colleague and patient questionnaires on the GMC website in my current appraisal?
The colleague and patient questionnaires on the GMC website are draft patient and colleague questionnaires developed by the GMC. The questionnaires are currently being tested through ongoing research conducted by Professor John Campbell at Peninsula Medical School. If you would like more information on Professor Campbell's research, or you are interested in participating in the research, please contact us on revalidation@gmc-uk.org.
While you are welcome to use the draft questionnaires on our website for your own purposes it is important to understand their current status and that, at the present time, they are not accredited or approved by the GMC for revalidation or any other purpose.
9. I am developing colleague and patient questionnaires for use in revalidation. What are the requirements that questionnaires have to meet? Will there be any guidance available?
The GMC has developed a set of principles, criteria and key indicators that all colleague and patient questionnaires should meet in order to be fit for the purpose of revalidation. We are currently consulting on these principles and criteria as part of our consultation on revalidation.
We also plan to put in place arrangements for accrediting those questionnaires that satisfy the agreed principles and criteria. This will enable doctors, and health care organisations purchasing questionnaires to be confident that they are fit for purpose. More information about the principles and criteria, and about our plans for accrediting questionnaires, is contained in section 3 of our revalidation consultation document.
10. How many hours Continuing Professional Development (CPD) will I need to complete in order to revalidate?
Continuing Professional Development (CPD) must be tailored to the specific needs and interests of individuals and their practice. It would not be appropriate for revalidation to set prescriptive requirements for all doctors about the number of hours of CPD they must undertake.
However, revalidation does need to provide assurance that doctors are keeping up to date. Evidence of participation in appropriate CPD, as brought to appraisal, is one way of doing this.
In developing the specialty standards for revalidation the medical Royal Colleges and Faculties have described participation in CPD as one of the ways in which doctors will be able to show that they are meeting the required standards. They currently require their members to complete 50 credits of CPD per annum and a total of 250 credits in a five-year revalidation cycle. This applies whether a doctor is full-time or part-time. You may find that participation in College or Faculty CPD schemes is helpful both in keeping up to date and in demonstrating compliance with the standards.
However, we will not require you to be a member of a College or Faculty in order to revalidate. Nor will we require doctors to participate in a College- or Faculty-run CPD scheme. Doctors must be able to show through appraisal that they are keeping up to date. This applies whether they are full-time or part-time. Doctors cannot have less regard to maintaining their competence and performance just because they are not in full-time practice.
Although we do not believe that setting prescriptive requirements for CPD in revalidation is helpful, we have identified some core principles that should guide doctors in their CPD activity. These are set out in Section 2 of the consultation document.
11. What is the minimum number of clinical sessions that I would need to work in order to revalidate?
Revalidation will not require doctors to undertake a set minimum number of hours or sessions.
Doctors will need to provide information about the full range of their work to show that they are practising to the appropriate standards in their specialty or field of practice.
This information will need to cover the four domains and 12 attributes described in the Good Medical Practice Frameworkfor appraisal and assessment. The four domains are:
- knowledge, skills and performance
- safety and quality
- communication, partnership and teamwork
- maintaining trust