EBME Forums Forums Management Professional Issues VRCT - A death knell

Further going back to the initial post it is worth the time to download and read the document being refered to. Whilst all of the document is worth reading chapters, 4, 6 and 7 should be fully understood - chapter 4 unregulated workers para 4.3 and 4.4 are key in these the need for assurance of workforce competancy is stated along with the enablement of of a system of assured volentary registration for groups not currently subject to statutory professional regulation.

So by default it will be come a reguire to be registered as it the simplist way for an employer to assure themselves that youa re competant is to ask for a copy of your volentary reg certificate.

So for the VRCT a death knell, its actually quite the reverse. The great advantage of volentary registration is that you don't need what has been the biggest stumbling block to date and the greatest slowing down in the process a statement in law i.e. statute.

There is therefore I hope now a real prospect of rapid forward advancement.

Reading through the document, section 4.9 is contradictory. it states:
No staff will be compelled to join these registers and employers will not be required to employ staff from these registers, though they could choose to do so. Where providers and those that they provide care for see benefit in employing staff who are nationally assured through a voluntary register, they will be able to do so, either by requiring registration when advertising posts, or seeking a commitment to join a register and training and developing existing staff so that they are able to do so.


Section 4.11 states:

Rather than a single statutory approach regardless of local needs and local approaches, quality assured voluntary registration will provide greater flexibility and give the public and local employers greater control and responsibility for how they assure themselves about the quality of staff. For the overwhelming majority of occupational and professional groups which are not currently subject to statutory regulation and which are generally not considered to present a high level of risk to the public, but where recommendations that regulation should be introduced have been made (including those groups recommended by the HPC for statutory regulation in the past, but not yet registered), the assumption will be that assured voluntary registration would be the preferred option.

This apparently gives the VRCT the green light to carry on albeit with much reduced authority.
What needs to happen now is that we (biomeds) as a whole take the VRCT to task and break it up into more appropriate sections. We need to ditch the "patient facing" technicians i.e. those who operate Gamma Cameras, Inject Radioisotopes, carry out Nerve Conduction studies etc. They can call themselves "Clinical whatever they want". Once we separate the VRCT into clinical and non-clinical sections we can start again. After all, the main reason for combinig what were two completely different professions was to get the numbers up so that the HPC would take notice. Now that is out of the window, the assured voluntary registers can be as big or as small as they want just as long as they can afford to run them, see appendix A of the document.

Most people assume that we need regulation, but is there a massive problem with incompitant techs and more importantly would regulation filter out these techs or improve them? As there will be a cost involved in regulation and it might mean that there may be vacances not filled witch otherwise might have been, then this needs to be considered.

Oh ... is there? Just where, exactly?

Vacancies filled, but with incompetent technicians? Which way is it?

I would suggest:- neither!

I don't think there a huge amount of incompitant techs either. People make mistakes and even engage in bad practices but regulation won't necessarily stop that.

And the second response later if they want will be?

This doesn't mean anything, from my interpretation of this it's just saying they won't immediately impose compulsory regulation, it doesn't really tell us anything we don't already know.

If anything section 4 seems to suggest what we already know that the renamed HPC will be able to hold voluntary registers and is basically old news.

Not the death knell - just another obstacle in the path which needs to be negotiated!

It's very difficult to pin down what we actually do. Some of us are more "hands on" than others i.e. some will assist medical staff with clinical issues and others may never see the inside of a ward. Therefore it is almost impossible to achieve a one-size-fits-all solution to our jobs. It is foolish to assume that we can. What we can do is address the parts of our job that are common to most and work up from there.
Not all Biomeds will be employed at band 5 or above. We, for example have technical staff on bands 3 & 4 who primarily work on low tech stuff and carry out PPMs on a selected list of equipment. I was against the idea originally but financially it made sense, a band 5 PPMing a flowmeter is a bit extravagant.
We need to look at our own departments and assess our particular needs i.e. how do we give assurances to our Trust (employers) that every member of staff is competent to do their job? A good starting point would be to adopt a Quality Assurance system (ISO 9000 type of thing). Within the QAS state the requirements for every grade of staff within your dept including A&C staff. For example an ATO might be required to attain C&G or NVQ2/3 in an appropriate subject coupled with manufacturers' training courses. A "working grade" biomed may be required to hold a suitable HNC or equivalent together with appropriate training.
Appropriate training could take the form of on-the-job assessment (in-house), ad-hoc courses relevant to the job i.e. basic human physiology, medical terminology etc. or short secondments (>1 week) to relevant departments i.e. Theatres, ECG etc.
This training would be assessed in the tech's annual performance review. This way training can be tailored to the individual at a time and stage suitable to their career progression. If further assurances were required, the individuals could always join the IET (or IPEM if the mood takes them) and apply for EngTech, IEng or CEng depending on their level of work.

One of the most important things we need to bear in mind is, how do we get the right staff in the first place? To avoid a shortage of biomeds we need to be able to recruit from a wide range of sources.
From experience I’ve found that the best biomeds come from other service industries. These people have the right skill set to apply themselves to the job in hand, something that cannot be taught at college/ university. If they do not have the educational qualifications required measures should be taken to allow them to achieve the required qualifications. This should be carried out concurrently with on the job training and manufacturers’ courses.
Obviously as a benevolent employer the NHS will insist on employing people directly from school or college. Starting with a clean slate as it were we need to ensure that the trainee gets the right engineering grounding. There is no point teaching a trainee how to set up an infusion or take an ECG if the don’t know their Amps from their Electrodes.
There is a shift away from pure electronics towards more IT involvement in our work so it would be useful to make sure that the trainee has a decent grounding in IT & electronics.

Oh! Hang on, that’s what we are doing already and have done for as long as I can remember. If it ain’t broke, don’t try and fix it!! (Unless it requires a PPM )

I do not wish to upset anyone, however, when reading the numerous posts to this excellent forum and particularly regarding the VRCT, I do hope a spelling and grammar test is not part of the required competency for registration!

If it was then maybe only Geoff Hannis would pass. I'm really not too sure about some of the other contributors.

Perhaps I am just pedantic or maybe it's just an age thing. Before you ask, I failed my eleven plus and left school without 'O' levels, but like the vast majority of us then, I could add up and spell with some understanding of grammar without certificates and registrations to prove it.

Never a more true word said Barney.