Dumfries & Galloway NHS Board
Education Centre
Making the Most of Foundation Training in Dumfries and Galloway
Your Foundation year in Dumfries is a busy time, so we have drawn together some rules and hints to help you make the most of it.
Who’s Who
You will be told who your Educational Supervisor is on day 1 in FY1, and in some blocks you may have more than one clinical supervisor, again you will be told at the start of the block. We also have a whole team of people here who are committed to ensuring you get the most out of your Foundation Year, so come and talk to us, share your worries, concerns, likes and dislikes.
Dr Peter Armstrong, Foundation Programme Director (FPD), will be very important to you. He oversees the teaching programme, will help with any difficulties and is also responsible for signing you off at the end of the year!
Jennie Pawson is the Foundation Programme Administrator. Jennie works with the FPD to arrange your programme and should be your first port of call for any administrative concerns, uncertainty about collection of evidence, etc. If you have any other issues about which you want advice, Jennie will always be happy to point you in the right direction for whatever help you may need.
Anne-Marie Coxon is the Education Centre Manager. She works with all the administrative and medical staff to ensure that the Centre and all the training programmes run smoothly and will help you with any difficulties when Jennie is away.
Dr Jean Robson is the Director of Medical Education (DME) and has a role in overseeing your programme. She will help you with any difficulties when the FPD is away, and should be your first port of call if you have any difficulties which you wish to discuss confidentially with someone outside your working team. She will try to sort out any issues you may have, so feel free to come and chat.
Meeting Your Educational Supervisor
In FY1 you will be allocated an educational supervisor for the whole year, that person will be your first port of call if you have any difficulties with work, need advice or help. It is VITAL that you arrange to see your educational supervisor as soon as possible after you arrive, definitely within the first two weeks. You will have regular meetings with your educational supervisor, as an absolute minimum at the beginning and end of each block. In FY2 your educational supervisor may change with each block, again arranging meetings early is very important.
Arranging meetings is YOUR responsibility, please do it in plenty of time, ideally 3-4 weeks before the date you would like. This gives you and your supervisor time to prepare information for the meeting. DO NOT LEAVE arranging end of block meetings until the very end of the block; remember your supervisor may have holidays, etc. These meetings are essential to complete your foundation year satisfactorily and MUST be arranged on time. It is not acceptable to arrange an end of block review half way through the next block! This detracts from the next block!
At your end of block meetings, you will be expected to discuss your progress, review the development plan that you wrote at the beginning of block meeting and plan to meet your priority learning needs. You will also need to review your teaching session attendance, this is a criterion for sign off – FY doctors MUST provide evidence that they have covered 70% of the teaching programme. Before you attend your end of block meeting, collect evidence of attendance from Jennie.
Work Based Assessments
Work Based Assessments are the tool that we use to assess you, but much more importantly, they help us to identify areas that you need to work on, you are not expected to be perfect! DO NOT leave completing your assessments until the end of the block; it is VERY important that all assessments for each block are completed within that block, not left until the next one.
Multi-Source Feedback (TAB) requires colleagues to rate you by filling in a form on e-Portfolio, and must to be done in the first and second blocks. Remember this is a small hospital and many of you will be doing it at about the same time, so start early to ensure that you have completed it before your end of block meeting.
e-Portfolio
Make the most of your e-Portfolio! Those of you who are new to the e-Portfolio: spend some time getting to understand it, and then use it. The more information you add the easier it will be for your educational supervisor to understand your aspirations and needs and help you achieve them.
If you have not completed all your e-portfolio tasks in time, you cannot be signed off at the end of the year and this will mean failure to progress to the next stage of training. This is not intended to alarm you, but to alert you to the fact that there is no option to completing your tasks!
Sickness
Many doctors working in the NHS treat themselves or seek advice from inappropriate sources such as A&E. Do not do this - it leads to inappropriate treatment and is not in your best interest. Register with a local practice and if you are unwell and need help consult your GP. Occupational Health services are available should your problem be work related. Should you feel this is the case, please seek advice from your educational supervisor, your GP, or someone in the education department if you prefer.
After every period of sickness of 3 days or more, or if 3 days or more are taken in any one month, you MUST meet with your educational supervisor for a back to work interview. It is important that we are aware of any health problems and sickness which may cause problems in signing you off at the end of the year. So if you are sick, and unable to attend work you MUST:
1. Contact your clinical supervisor
2. Contact the Education Centre
Anne-Marie or one of her staff will then:
a) inform HR for you,
b) inform the Departmental senior manager for the dept in which you work,
c) inform your educational supervisor, and
d) record period of absence on e-portfolio
Holiday and Study Leave
Study leave is not permitted in Foundation years. Holidays must be taken in each block. In FY1, these are given to you according to your rota. If you have any requests these should be made to HR asap, or if the rota has already been made up and you have important reasons to be off then you may arrange swaps. In FY2, holiday must be agreed with the departments you are working in, holiday entitlement must be taken in each block, and may not be carried over.
Adverse Incident Reporting
In this hospital we are keen to promote safe working practices and have an adverse incident reporting system (Datix) which we would encourage you to use. We know that ALL doctors (and everyone else) make mistakes and aim to develop systems that ensure that when we make mistakes, systems pick these up before harm occurs. This is not checking up on us, or you, it is developing systems which include double checks! If someone reports an incident that involves you, try to view this as not a cause for upset, anger, or embarrassment, but as an opportunity to contribute to the safe and efficient running of the hospital. If you see an incident which involves yourself or others, contribute in the same way.
In summary enjoy yourselves; work hard; keep up to date with your e-Portfolio - catching up is hard!
If you have any problems at all come and speak to us, we are here to help you.