Minutes of the Diagnostics Specialty Training Board meeting held at 10.30 am on Tuesday 1 September 2015in Forest Grove House, Foresterhill, Aberdeen (with videoconference links)

Aberdeen: Peter Johnston (PJ) Chair, John Cummings (JC), Vicki Hayter (VH)

Glasgow: Frances Dorrian (FD), Clair Evans (CE), Peter Galloway (PG), Dan Ho (DH), Wilma Kincaid (WK), Iain McGlinchey (IMcG)

Dundee: Stewart Fleming (SF) to item 5 only, Clare McKenzie (CMcK)

Edinburgh: John Bremner (JB), Marie Mathers (MM), Hamish McRitchie (HMcR)

Inverness: Emma Watson (EW)

Inattendance: Paola Solar (PS)

Item / Lead
Welcome and apologies
The Chair welcomed Clare McKenzie, who will be new PG Dean in the East from October and will therefore be the new LDD for the Diagnostics STB. The group introduced themselves and the apologies were noted.
Minutes of meeting held on 16 June 2015
The minutes of the previous meeting were approved as a correct record.
Matters arising
3.1. / PCAT information
PJ had been in touch with Reem Al Soufi who was the Clinical Leadership Fellow leading this work. She has now moved on but a new SCLF have taken up this work.
The PCAT project looks at the design of rotas for trainees, to fit educational programmes. This work is ongoing.
Recruitment
4.1. / Recruitment update: information from specialty leads
  • Radiology – No gaps
  • Interventional Radiology – 1 gap
  • CIT – 2 gaps in South East Virology
  • Forensic Histopathology – 2 gaps
  • Paediatrics/Neonatal Pathology – We have one post currently which was advertised but for which no applications were received
  • Histopathology – was full, but 2 trainees had left the programme in the summer – these are now advertised. Another 2 will be OOP to start a one year Masters in September. These will be advertised as LATs.
  • The University of Glasgow has advertised a Pathology Lecturer (SCREDS) post. Karen Owen will be the Academic Mentor for the post.
It was felt that recruitment had been successful in general. The Forensic and Paediatric pathology posts will be fine as they will be recruited from ST3 Histopathology trainees.
JB expressed some concern about Virology in CIT as there is a move to replace Consultant posts with Grade 7 Biomedical Scientist staff in the laboratories. This may lead to a Service entirely provided by non-medical AHP.
4.2. / Medical Specialty Training Intake numbers for 2016
The response paper to Rowan Parks had been put together quite quickly over the summer as the deadline had been moved to the end of July. PJ had used the trends over the years to analyse the numbers.
The group discussed at length the issue of the lack of career structure for Clinical Scientists, who are needed to feed into the roles of Clinical Pathologists. EW noted that the training of Clinical Scientists in her region follows the same programme as regular MMB trainees, and this has given excellent results. Clinical Scientists are trained for different specialty outputs. JB noted that there are practical issues such as Clinical Scientists without a medical degree who cannot give advice about prescriptions or work out of hours in a medical capacity. It was felt that the STB needs to present a strategy to the Scottish Government and the College, solving the obstacles and smoothing practicalities. PJ will take this forward.
The paper recommended the increase of Radiology numbers as much as possible. After some discussion, it was agreed that PJ will send a new recommendation to Rowan Parks with the following numbers:
5 Clinical Radiology + 2 Interventional Radiology + 1 Neuro Interventional Radiology.
If fallow funding is confirmed again for this year, 1 additional Clinical Radiology will be requested.
The distribution will be:
Clinical Radiology: 6 in the West (5 if no additional CR), 1 in the North
Interventional Radiology: 1 in the West, 1 in the East
Neuro IR: 1 in the South East
For Histopathology, it was recommended an increase on establishment of 4-6, and 2 in Paediatric Pathology. The latter will be based in the West and once it is an established programme, they will look into developing the programme in the rest of Scotland.
The group was concerned about the Histopathology profiling done by the Scottish Government Health Workforce, as they base their figures in the ISD data, which is not accurate. There are currently 142 consultants in SPAN, but the ISD only lists 82. ISD have been given the correct data several times in the past but there has been no change. It was noted that the biggest difference was in NHS Lothian, so MM will make sure that their numbers are accurate in ISD. PJ will check the ISD data and see where the other discrepancies are.
MM noted that the South East training capacity was full, but the increase in trainee numbers can easily be absorbed in the rest of Scotland.
Ralph Bouhaidar is liaising with Justice to obtain funding for one more Forensic Pathology trainee.
Chemical Pathology is in need of a strategy and PJ noted that he will discuss this at his meeting with Stewart Irvine on Friday. It was suggested that the smaller specialties should be looked at by a small subgroup, inviting Scottish Government and College colleagues, as well as Rob Farley from NES. PJ will check that this is ok with Stewart Irvine and will coordinate. / PJ
PJ
MM
PJ
PJ
Interim LAT policy
The LAT Policy had been distributed for information. Helen McIntosh is getting feedback from the Health Boards about it.
MM noted that point 4.4 is a change from what currently happens, and they will have to recruit annually.
EW indicated that, from a Service point of view, this policy was very helpful and welcome. The policy is about bringing consistency for LAT appointments across Scotland.
ARCPs
The Specialty Leads are asked to bring data to the next meeting in order to look at consistency across the specialties. This will be fed into the new QI/QM process. / TPDs
Scotland Deanery: QI/QM Framework
The first QRP for Diagnostics will take place on 29 September in Aberdeen.
EW noted that if some of the DMEs are not fully engaged with the process is partially because they are only asked to be observers in the QRPs, so their input is not required.
Scottish Careers Fair 12.09.15
PJ will be doing the talk on the day. He will send the draft around the Board for comments and feedback. / PJ
Update reports
9.1. / LDD
CMcK was present at the Board but will only take post officially in October, so she had nothing to update.
9.2. / Histopathology
MM reported that the updated curriculum has been published in the College website. There are very few changes in Molecular pathology, which need to be discussed. The College Training Committee is meeting next week to discuss Shape of Training.
Neuropathology hopes to advertise in spring. There is some interest already.
9.3. / Paediatric Pathology
CE reported that the advert was posted. There are only 5 vacancies in the UK.
9.4. / Forensic Pathology
There was no representative.
9.5. / Radiology
No further updates.
9.6. / Medical Microbiology
No representative.
9.7. / Virology
JB reported that they have an unfilled post in CIT MV-ID which has been filled with a LAS for 6 months. The other post is ready for recruitment.
Both posts will be advertised for a February start.
9.8. / Chemical Pathology and Metabolic Medicine
PG reported that they are revising the structure of the exam. Credentialling may be difficult for un-labelled centres in Scotland.
9.9. / Nuclear Medicine
Sai Han had sent the information about the specialty. There is only 1 post in Scotland, which has been vacant for the past 3 years.
The group noted with concern that the Medicine STB had recommended that this post is disestablished. The specialty has not long ago become part of Diagnostics so the group were perplexed as to why had Medicine made a recommendation. PJ will chase this up with Rowan Parks.
The STB recommendation for Nuclear Medicine is to try and recruit the one post via the Radiology route, rather than the CMT route used until now. This will be quickly fed back to Rowan Parks. / PJ
PJ
9.10. / Trainees
No further updates.
9.11. / Academic issues
No further updates.
9.12. / Service issues
EW reported no further updates.
9.13. / DME
No further updates.
9.14. / Lay Representative
No further updates.
Received for information
10.1. / Nuclear Medicine curriculum
The papers were sent for information.
AOB
There was no other business.
Date of next meeting
Wednesday 7 October 2015, at 10.30am, Forest Grove House, with Videoconference.

Action points

Item No. / Item Name / Action / Lead
4.2 / Medical Specialty Intake Numbers 2016 / To consider STB strategy for Scottish Government and Colleges.
To send new numbers recommendation to Rowan Parks
To make sure that ISD has the correct number of Histopathology consultants in their data
To check for discrepancies in the ISD data for Histopathology consultants
To meet with Rob Farley to discuss Clinical Scientists career structure, and take a paper to SG and the Scottish Council of the College
To obtain agreement from Stewart Irvine to form a Diagnostics Small Specialties Subgroup and coordinate / PJ
PJ
MM
PJ
PJ
PJ
6 / ARCPs / To bring ARCP outcomes data to next STB / TPDs
8 / Scottish Careers Fair / To send draft talk around the STB for feedback and comments / PJ
9.9 / Nuclear medicine update / To check with Rowan Parks that Nuclear Medicine falls under Diagnostics.
To make recommendation for recruitment of one post via Radiology / PJ
PJ

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