New GMC guidance for supervising physician associates (PAs) creates uncertainty for doctors and fails to address patient safety concerns, says DAUK.\r\n\r\nThe guidance includes advice on supervision, delegation and accountability when working with PAs and anaesthesia associates (AAs).\r\n\r\nIt is underpinned by the key principles from the professional standards and engagement with professional bodies, doctors, PAs and AAs, the GMC said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, the Doctors\u2019 Association UK is concerned that the guidance is poor and does not address issues around supervision.\r\n\r\nThese issues include the supervisor retaining responsibility and accountability for patient care.\r\n\r\nThis means supervising doctors will be liable for mistakes, said Dr Steve Taylor, DAUK\u2019s GP spokesperson.\r\n\r\nDr Taylor said: \u201cDoctors need to be sure that the task they are delegating is within the scope of the PA.\r\n\r\n\u201cIn many cases the supervisor will not have sufficient knowledge of the PA\u2019s training, knowledge, or capabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBecause the supervisor retains responsibility and accountability for patient care, the supervisor will need to be confident the patient is being treated appropriately, safely, and has been thoroughly assessed.\r\n\r\n\u201cSupervision is not straightforward and currently there are no training requirements for supervisors.\r\n\r\n\u201cThis means patients primarily, as well as PAs and doctors, are being placed in positions that are not ideal at best and unsafe at worst.\r\n\r\n\u201cThe delegating doctor retains responsibility for patient care, and therefore will be liable for mistakes. Patient safety and care needs to be paramount.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis effectively places doctors in a medico-legal minefield and open to GMC referrals for mistakes, as medical defence organisations such as the MDU make clear<\/a>.\u201d\r\n\r\nDr Taylor added: \u201cDoctors will remain responsible for the overall management of the patient, decisions around transfer of care, and the processes in place to ensure patient safety.\r\n\r\n\u201cAlthough AAs and PAs remain accountable for their actions, a doctor will retain responsibility for the overall management of the patient and the system of supervision.\u201d\r\n\r\nDr Taylor said the guidance lacked certainty for doctors, failed to address significant patient safety concerns, and did not provide a comprehensive framework for supervision of PAs and AAs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He said: \u201cMore certainty and clarification is needed, and employers need to be aware of the significant implications of supervision, including training, assessment and monitoring.\r\n\r\n\u201cThis was highlighted by Nuffield Trust<\/a> in respect to general practice supervision of other roles, but can also be extended to hospitals.\u201d\r\n\r\nPlease support our work by contributing to our crowd funder<\/a> or by becoming a member<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" New GMC guidance for supervising physician associates (PAs) creates uncertainty for doctors and fails to address patient safety concerns, says DAUK. The guidance includes advice…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1477,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65,691],"tags":[640,116,654,636],"class_list":["post-1368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dauk-news","category-medical-allied-professions","tag-anaesthesia-associates","tag-gmc","tag-physician-associate","tag-physician-associates"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1368\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dauk.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Certainty and clarification<\/h3>\n\n\n\n