Royal College of Anaesthetists
From Mmc
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16 March 07
Statement re MTAS Friday 16 March 2007
The Review Team has met again today, partly by teleconference, and a communication will be placed on the MMC website as soon as it has been passed by Ministers in the four countries.
J Hulf PRESIDENT
16 Mar 2007
12 March 07
Statement re MTAS Monday 12 March 2007
Following discussions at the DH last week the attached letter was sent by the DH to all applicants to MTAS on the evening of Friday 9th March.
Over the weekend there have been confusing reports in the press implying that the proposed application form review might apply only to applicants for surgical posts: it does not. It applies to all long-listed but not short-listed applicants to all specialties.
The details of the mechanism of the application review and the form of round 2 will be the subject of work during the coming week. It is quite possible that the timetable of round 2 will now be subject to revision.
09 March 07
Statement re MTAS Friday 9th March
A statement from the MTAS review team at the Department of Health will be issued later this evening. I am unable to tell you the details until it has passed ministerial approval. I want to assure you that we have heeded the evidence provided from all quarters and identified shortcomings in the process, while recognising that in many deaneries the interview process has worked well. We are also anxious to emphasize that the vast amount of work carried out during selection is recognised and appreciated.
Those of you who are expecting to interview next week should assume that interviews are going ahead. In respect of ST2 and 3 candidates you should be aware that at interview applicants can be probed in depth without requirement to keep to identical questions each time. The applicant’s full CV/application form must be available to all interviewers and only if full criteria are met should posts be filled in round one.
08 March 07
When representatives of the Academy met with the Secretary of State on Monday evening it was agreed that the deaneries be advised of the following for the round 1 interview process;
Information to go out to all appointment committee chairs that:
- applicant's FULL CV must be available to interviewers at interview.
- applicants can be probed in depth at interview without requirements to keep to identical questions each time.
- it is not necessary to fill all posts in round 1 if criteria are not met.
We are informed that all deans have been appraised of these instructions but we feel that you should be aware. We trust that it will make the task of interviewers easier.
If you encounter any local difficulties with this please coordinate your reply through your RA who should send it to training@rcoa.ac.uk. The College is not staffed to cope with 350 responses to every MTAS problem!
J Hulf, President
06 March 07
Modernising Medical Careers (MMC) and the Medical Training Application Service (MTAS): An updated statement from the President
Further to my previous statement posted on our website on Friday, 2 March, I write to bring you up to date on moves to alleviate the problems created by MTAS for the selection of doctors due to start or continue their postgraduate training in August. Yesterday morning, Monday, 5 March 2007, the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges (AoMRC) met to discuss the crisis of junior doctor recruitment caused by the failings as reported to the Colleges in the MTAS selection process. The Academy subsequently produced a press statement which is reproduced on the College website. In the evening the Chairman of the Academy, the Chairman of the Academy trainees group, two other Presidents and I went to the Department of Health to brief the Secretary of State, and others, on the situation. We went with a list of action points to be addressed: those requiring immediate action, action needed for Round 2 and those for the future. The outcome was that there will be two more meetings with the Department, tomorrow and Thursday, that I shall be attending to agree damage limitation measures for Round 1 and to agree how to prevent a repetition of the worst problems for Round 2. The Department of Health will be issuing a statement today and below is a statement just issued by the Academy:
AoMRC PRESS STATEMENT For immediate release – Tuesday, 6 March 2007
Medical Training Application Service (MTAS) The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges welcomes the Government’s decision to carry out an immediate review of the Medical Training Application Service, the new system by which doctors are now selected and placed for specialist training.
Shortcomings in this critical element of the Department of Health programme Modernising Medical Careers have caused dismay and much distress.
The Academy will work with the Department in the review, to ensure the necessary action is taken to remedy faults and to restore confidence.
I am very grateful to all Regional Advisors (RAs), their Deputies, College Tutors and Training Programme Directors who are continuing to work far beyond the call of duty to make the selection system function. I would also like to thank all our Fellows and trainees who have provided detailed evidence of MTAS’s shortcomings. Without this it would be impossible to produce a case strong enough to withstand the objections of the organisations we will have to criticise. I have to ask that for the time being evidence you wish us to be aware of is filtered through the regional representatives, e.g. the Regional Advisers. The volume of e-mails is now hindering our ability to compile our case! The staff and I still want the information but in compiled form and not as individual e-mails please. We leave you to judge whether your information is so new that it must come directly to us.
There are three points I would like to bring to your attention because I think they are important.
- Firstly it is not always helpful to your or the College’s case to equate MTAS with MMC when criticising the former.
- MMC is the Department of Health’s strategy to implement a better way of training doctors through the reform of postgraduate training programmes and in some respects is not very different from the anaesthetic training programme that has been in place since 2000. Whilst MMC is not perfect I believe that with time and reasoned argument it can be significantly improved.
- MTAS is the single, national application and selection process designed and introduced to deal with applications for postgraduate training, all made to the same deadline to start employment on the 1st August 2007.
- It is MTAS where the problems lie and that is where we must concentrate our constructive criticism today.
- Secondly, as I wrote in my previous statement, there is at the moment no conclusive evidence that all the problems attributed to MTAS are uniformly spread throughout the UK. This makes it more difficult to know whether to level criticism at local or national procedures.
- Thirdly, although there is evidence that many specialties have been affected, it is possible that the problems have been most acute in a few large specialties, including anaesthesia. This again influences the approach that the College must take.
None of the above points alter my determination to make every effort on behalf of both our assessors and applicants to ensure that the worst failings of Round 1 can be eased and will not be repeated in Round 2.
Dr Judith Hulf President, The Royal College of Anaesthetists
06 Mar 2007
02 march 07
MMC and MTAS: a College statement
MODERNISING MEDICAL CAREERS (MMC) and the MEDICAL TRAINING APPLICATION SERVICE (MTAS): an RCoA statement
Since the start of the MTAS selection process the Royal College of Anaesthetists has encouraged trainers and applicants to make the College (and the deaneries) aware of the positive and negative aspects of the system.
The College, its President, Council and Training Department wish to place on record their pride in how our Fellows, who represent the College as assessors, have worked so hard at local level to make MTAS work.
We are aware from our Fellows, trainees and applicants for anaesthetic posts of accumulating evidence of serious faults within MTAS. The problems are not uniform throughout the UK which may be attributable in part to local deanery resources and management structures; some deanery processes have worked better than others. We are also aware that for reasons which are not yet clear, some deaneries have had far greater demand for anaesthesia training posts than others which has created extra problems. However, short-listing results nationally are clearly causing genuine anguish.
We are urging, at the highest level, that an urgent review of the MTAS process takes place so that the second round of applications this year takes account of the evidence you have provided. Our current efforts concentrate on this and should not be interpreted as replacing any actions to improve matters at local level. The College cannot judge how individual applicants have been served by MTAS and challenges to the process must be left to individuals. The current round of applications is unlikely to be halted.
Without robust, documented evidence about difficulties in the administrative process we are unlikely to have any effect. We will hold the original dossier of information, add any further evidence we receive and present an anonymised version to the directors of MMC.
In the meantime I will continue to make every effort on behalf of both our assessors and applicants to ensure that the failings of Round 1 are not repeated in Round 2.
Judith Hulf President The Royal College of Anaesthetists
02 Mar 2007
