Dear Colleague
You may recall that we sent you an email recently seeking your
views on the number of CCTs in psychiatry. We are very grateful to
the many members who responded to this email, the majority of whom
supported a change to one CCT, including members from all
specialties. We are now writing to let you know that Council agreed
at its meeting on 26 June that the College should ask the
Department of Health to reduce the number of CCTs to one. As with
other Colleges that have one CCT, we will be able to list our
specialties on the Specialist Register. One reason for this is to
allow newer specialties in Psychiatry to be added without having to
go to Parliament every time.
As part of the application process, the Department of Health
will consult extensively. The process is expected to be very
lengthy and if the conditions required by the College cannot be
met, we will withdraw the application. The proposal is as
follows:
- Specialist curricula will remain as now with child and
adolescent, forensic, general adult, learning disability, old age
psychiatry and psychotherapy all having equivalent status as
specialties within psychiatry .
- Specialty status will be shown on the GMC Specialist Register,
e.g. Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
- Additional specialist curricula e.g. in addiction,
liaison psychiatry, rehabilitation, neuropsychiatry and perinatal
psychiatry will be able to be submitted to PMETB for approval.
- The new Education Committees, integral to each Faculty, will
work closely with the Dean on maintaining up to date curricula.
Faculties will be represented on the Education, Training and
Standards Committee - the College's key committee responsible for
specialty training.
- Selection into specialty training will continue to take place
after trainees pass the Membership Examination.
We believe this important decision will, if agreed by the
Department of Health, strengthen the existing specialties within
psychiatry, enable the development of newer specialties, improve
standards and thus enhance patient care.
Please be patient however as we have been warned that the
process could take as long as seven years.
Professor Sheila Hollins, President
Professor Dinesh Bhugra, Dean