The Connect Health Change webinar ‘Education – the passport to the future’ took place on 10 February 2021 and welcomed over 150 delegates.
The expert speakers highlighted four key recommendations to improve and develop clinical education and learning going forward:
- Understand and use the guidance and structure
- Learn from others through interdisciplinary learning
- Start to gather information and evidence now to build your portfolios
- Learn through multiple lenses – clinical, research and education perspectives
Advanced clinical practice (ACP) is a rapidly developing area of practice that has gained much recognition. The recent Advanced Practice Roadmap from Health Education England has laid out a clear structure of governance and education development that will allow first contact and advanced practitioners to develop the high standards of skills required for working in primary care through to intermediate and secondary care.
Exploring how staff can be supported via education, the webinar discussed how the roadmap translates into practice; the importance of having supported education programmes and how education through to Level 7 can be achieved, through higher education institutions (HEIs) or other formally supervised programmes via the portfolio route.
Chaired by Amanda Hensman-Crook, Consultant MSK physiotherapist, Health Education England (HEE) AHP clinical fellow chaired the session. She described how the roadmap to FCP (First Contact Practitioners) and ACP is well landed for MSK and there are many clinicians on their way to developing their portfolios and many others moving onto the teaching side with the FCP master’s module.
It’s got a really clear structure of governance and education development with supervision and very clear boundaries, but how do advanced practitioners develop the high standards of skills required for primary care? Up to now we’ve relied on job descriptions and pay bandings which of course doesn’t prove a capability or support career pathways.
The webinar also featured:
Ashley James, National Clinical Education Lead, Connect Health who introduced the Academy and the effective and practical implementation of portfolio education at a large scale.
Our approach was about understanding what our colleagues needed to know, agreeing the commitment of time, mapping a multi-disciplinary curriculum, identifying our faculty and the design and implementation of our digital platforms. We’ve tried to make sure our curriculum has a direct link to the competency framework so it allows our teams to understand that every session they’re doing is meaningful in directing their development. We have 11 curriculum streams that start from our graduate development programme at level 6 where clinicians enter the organisation, right the way through to advanced practice.
Dr Giles Hazan, GPwER MSK Medicine, Sussex Partnership Foundation Trust, BASEM Education Committee Member, RCGP Representative (MSK) and Versus Arthritis Core Skills Trainer then went on to discuss the central role of developing the GP standards and GPwER education and accreditation.
What I’ve been working on with a range of groups that represent the non-surgical / non-interventional specialties dealing with MSK medicine, is a collaboration hosted by the Faculty of Sports and Exercise Medicine. We are developing the pathways to practice for GPs with an extended role, very much mirroring the work in the physiotherapy world and what this does is create a unique and incredibly valuable opportunity for us to work together.
Kay Hurst, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Health, Psychology & Social Care, Manchester Metropolitan University explained the route to advanced practice and the role of HEI (Higher Education Institutions).
Going on a course is great but it’s about how we judge, question and apply that to our practice that makes it become a level 7 learning opportunity. Look at the roadmap in terms of what’s needed for your portfolio and start to keep records.
Dr Neil Langridge, NHS Consultant Physiotherapist, Southern Health NHS Trust, ended with a talk on the need for education to be able to support the implementation of the roadmap for Advanced Clinical Practice in MSK physiotherapy.
Looking back at physiotherapy in terms of the post registration education standards and career developments, I think we can say that up until recently, there’s not really been a clear agreed model for linking career pathways, standards and education into a coherent strategy. What we wanted with the roadmap and what’s really important for the profession is that these are nationally agreed and recognised assurances of governance and practice to the public that we serve. Really importantly it sets reference points for Agenda for Change grading which needs to be a clear development for the future.
Now is the time for recognition of a career pathway of attainment. Undergraduate and postgraduate courses need to be clearly linked to lifelong learning. We are now breeding undergrads that have an understanding of a portfolio, but there’s lots to be achieved in the future. We need transferable, standardised, pathways of education that makes sense of practice, in practice and beyond. We have universities setting up AP and FCP accreditation, but there is a massive gap for external support for in-practice mechanisms, supporting clinicians and the supervision and mentorship of these individuals. We need to consider the culture of building critical thinking reflective portfolios linked to national standards that build more for less, offering breadth and depth.
Finally all speakers were asked: What is the one thing you would recommend that we focus on to improve education going forward?
Ash: Guidance and structure
- I think for me it’s having guidance and structure. There is a lot of information, and different ways people can go with education at the moment and having that structure and the competency framework across not just FCP and APP but across all areas of development is something we need.
Giles: Interdisciplinary learning
- I’d have to say interdisciplinary learning. Learning together, work together, to break down some of the boundaries.
Kay: Information/evidence gathering
- I would start gathering information, a bit like a treasure hunt. It might be journal appraisals, records of discussions with supervisors, of reflections that you’ve taken. Start gathering it in the meantime, while you’re sorting out what’s going to happen next.
Neil: Multiple lenses
- I would advise anyone looking to build towards the Advanced Practice processes, to look at every clinical experience or every learning opportunity through multiple lenses. Get used to looking at the same thing in different ways. Look at it from a research perspective, an education perspective, and a clinical practice perspective. Be able to compare and contrast those influences on that learning experience, that will then start to demonstrate a synthesis rather than a description and that will culturally and organically take you into level seven practice.
Watch the webinar again which includes further insight from the speakers including a full Q&A session:
;
