Features: Chair's comment
29 January 2010
Shortly after becoming Chair I made a commitment to go around the UK once a month to meet doctors working at the front line of medicine to hear their views on the GMC and all that we do.
These visits are well under way and both I and my staff colleagues who come with me find them really useful and the feedback suggests that those we meet think they’re worthwhile too. Revalidation is of course always a major topic of conversation, and you’ll find details of our forthcoming consultation on page four, but we cover a lot of other ground.
I have an opportunity to explain how we spend your money and what we do to try and ensure that we are as efficient as possible. The doctors I speak to are often surprised, for example, that our website has six million hits a year and that our call centre has a quarter of a million calls annually – each call managed to completion by the person who first answers the phone.
I think there is still an image of us sitting in oak-panelled rooms, occasionally striking someone off the Register. In fact, we operate out of very modern premises in five locations – London, Manchester (where just over half our staff work) Edinburgh, Belfast and Cardiff. GMC Council members haven’t been involved in Fitness to Practise cases since 2003; these are run at arm’s length with panels recruited, trained and appraised for the purpose.
There is a lot more to the GMC: regulating medical education; ensuring professional standards are in tune with the world around us; and maintaining the Register – all core activities for our 550 staff and the many doctors and lay people who support them. If you would be interested in me coming to have a conversation with your local medical organisations, please let me know through my colleagues in the Office of the Chair and Chief Executive at occe@gmc-uk.org.
Finally, I’m delighted to welcome our new Chief Executive and Registrar, Niall Dickson. Niall will be known to many of you from his days as the BBC’s Health and Social Affairs Correspondent and more recently as Chief Executive of the King’s Fund.
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