New guidance to help you with reflection

New guidance has been published to support you in being reflective practitioners. 

It has been developed in partnership with the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges (AoMRC), the Conference of Postgraduate Medical Deans (COPMED), the General Medical Council (GMC) and the Medical Schools Council (MSC).

A range of stakeholders from all four countries of the UK have been involved in shaping the guidance, including doctors in training, medical students, appraisers, educators and trainers.

The AoMRC and COPMeD have also published a reflective practice toolkit. It includes a number of templates and examples for use alongside this guidance.

What the guidance contains

The guidance outlines the importance of reflection for personal development and learning and highlights how reflection can help maintain and improve standards of professional practice, helping to drive improvements in patient safety.

The guidance highlights key advice on being a reflective practitioner, including:

• Reflective notes do not need to capture full factual details of an experience. They should focus on the learning or actions taken from a case or situation.
• Reflection is personal and there is no one way to reflect.
• Having time to reflect on both positive and negative experiences is important.
• Group reflection often leads to ideas that can improve patient care.
• Tutors, supervisors, appraisers and employers should support individual and group reflection.

Next steps

The four co-producing organisations will now explore what other advice and guidance could be developed to provide even more practical support in this area.  This includes additional guidance and learning materials for medical students and educators as well as a range of case studies to help you apply the guidance.