The college role

Authors: Bill Burr 

Publication date:  10 Dec 2008

Arrangements for recruitment to medical training posts in England during the 2008 recruitment round, although ultimately successful, were protracted and inefficient for both applicants and selection panels. Unlimited applications to multiple deaneries resulted in a huge shortlisting task, which was duplicated in every deanery, and demotivated appointment panels interviewing good candidates whom they knew would not take posts in their deanery.

The English Modernising Medical Careers team wants to see the development of national recruitment based on fair, objective, and transparent methods and approached the Royal College of Physicians of London to see if there was interest in developing a coordinated approach to recruitment to core medical training (CMT) CT1 posts in all English deaneries for 2009.

The college set up a CMT recruitment steering group in late July 2008 to oversee development of the scheme, building on a consensus achieved by a panel of CMT programme directors in 2007. As a former postgraduate dean and newly appointed medical director of the Joint Royal Colleges of Physicians Training Board, I am pleased to lead the team which is developing the system to improve the efficiency and fairness of recruitment for junior doctors, consultants, deaneries, and all those concerned.

The new process should enable applicants to maximise their chances of being appointed to training posts in any English deanery in a simple, user friendly system requiring a single application. It is similar to that used successfully for recruitment to obstetrics and gynaecology and paediatrics in 2008. The system is web based and applicants will apply via a dedicated national portal from 9 am on 5 January 2009. The application can be regularly stored and updated until it is ready for submission (closing date 16 January at midday).

Applicants will be considered for shortlisting at the first and second choice units of application, with a chance of interviews at both locations. The interview process and scoring will be standardised to enable the scores to be cascaded to other units of application to maximise the placement of appointable candidates. Candidates will be able to book interviews online (avoiding clashes of interview times). The offer process for posts in CMT is being coordinated with general practice and psychiatry, allowing candidates to hold offers in the three specialties for a certain amount of time.

In addition, all applicants will take a clinical problem solving test on 21 February 2009. This is a machine marked test based on foundation competences developed by the General Practice National Recruitment Office. It has been shown to have a strong predictive value in GP recruitment, and correlated strongly with CMT interview results in applicants who applied to both general practice and CMT in 2008. Use of this test may be considered controversial, but the CMT recruitment team believes that selection to CMT will be made more fair and transparent if we can use objective, validated selection tools. Although for 2009 the results of the test will not be used as part of the selection process, the MMC Programme Board has advised that all CMT applicants must take the test or they will not be eligible to be interviewed.

21 February 2009 is an important date, in that applicants for both CMT and GP posts will be taking the clinical problem solving test, and therefore they will not be available for work on the night of 20 February and for part of 21 February. About half of the CMT applicants took the clinical problem solving test in 2008 without causing severe service disruption, but we acknowledge that there may be about another 1500 doctors (15% increase) taking the test in 2009. This means that rotas need to be planned to make sure that foundation year 2 doctors can take the test. In some areas, 20/21 February falls in half term week, which means that extra attention to rota planning will be needed.

Detailed information is available on a dedicated website at www.cmtrecruitment.org.uk. From this site, applicants can obtain full details about the process, from application through to appointment. From 5 January 2009, applicants for CMT CT1 posts will be able to register their details, access the application forms, and complete and submit them on line.

Access to help

As well as the usual help offered by each unit of application, a national helpdesk will run throughout the recruitment period. Similar support will be offered to CMT recruitment staff.

Evaluation

All elements of this recruitment project and pilot will be evaluated carefully as part of improving and refining the process annually.

Competing interests: None declared.

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Bill Burr CMT Recruitment project lead and director of the Joint Royal Colleges of Physicians Training Board London