Perfect training records for all staff are required at inspections. Even Consultants records may be required. UKAS seem unaware the the Royal College of Pathologists considers its records of Continuing Professional Development (CPD) to be private to each individual. Only that fact that they have met the required number of points is relevant to NHS management.
UKAS and CPA inspectors are often not qualified to the same level as those they inspect. Sometimes they have very limited knowledge of service issues outside the remit of the ISO standards. The ISO standards were designed for low level manufacturing staff, not the highly-qualified personnel of the pathology laboratory.
Unlike current CPD which records inputs, UKAS training records require a form of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) that requires verification of competence gained from the training. This is derived from Benjamin Bloom’s educational theories described in his Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. These theories were designed to classify the ways individuals are to act, think or feel as the result of participating in some unit of instruction.
Competences could be understood as outcomes.
New trainees and experienced professionals training in new lab techniques have to agree and sign off that they have been trained. But this is not enough. Supervisors have to witness and record their competence at this time and repeat the witnessing regularly to provide records for inspection.
And still errors occur occasionally. When the freedom and professionalism of individuals has been surrendered even inspection is not good enough to ensure protection. An expensive and complex way of selling confidence.
Elizabeth Loder writes:
“- the bulk of the “teaching” is still done through the traditional lecture method, even though research makes clear that listeners retain very little of what’s taught this way….
“The Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education is moving towards standards that require continuing medical education providers to track educational outcomes and show the effects, if any, of teaching activities on clinical practice. This seems likely to force reappraisal of traditional instruction methods and rapid changes in practice.”
Are training records and accreditation to replace qualifications and professionalism?
ISOwatch 