Regulating doctors, ensuring good medical practice

Medical student mental health operational group

This group is looking at how medical schools can best support students with mental health concerns. It is part of the wider review of health and disability.

What is the group doing

The group is overseeing the commissioning of research into the mental health of medical students. It is a joint project with the Medical Schools Council which we are leading on, and feeds into the wider review of health and disability in medical education and training.

Membership of the group (pdf) is drawn from the GMC’s former Undergraduate Board and organisations with an interest in this area.

Principles agreed

At it’s first meeting the group agreed that the following principles should underpin the research study.

  1. 1. The project should focus on supporting students with common mental health concerns. More serious issues such as severe psychotic illness should be considered but not as the main focus. Some examples of the types of conditions we would expect to see covered include depression, anxiety, eating disorders and addictions.
  2. 2. Although this research should primarily focus on medical students and undergraduate medical education, the implications for postgraduate training should be considered along with the transition process.

  3. 3. The primary aim of the overall project is to produce guidance that will be helpful to medical schools. The research team will need to bear this in mind as they prepare their bid and carry out their work.

Work strands identified

The group identified three distinct work strands which they will oversee.

  1. 1. Developing a tool for medical schools to use to identify problems in their own support systems for students. This tool will also allow schools to identify issues that are increasing the pressure on their students that they might not have been aware of. This work is being undertaken by Dr Debbie Cohen, Senior Medical Research Fellow and Director of The Individual Support Programme. Dr Cohen is based at the Centre for Psychosocial and Disability Research, Cardiff University.
  2. 2. Research into what medical schools currently do to support students with mental health concerns. This work should also identify case examples of best practice.
  3. 3. Developing guidance for medical schools as to how to best support medical students. This is the end product of the project. 

Further information

Please contact Clare Owen on 020 7189 5026 or cowen1@gmc-uk.org for further information on this work.