Under the new curriculum, will you still need to send in and pay for the FOM to re-mark an MSc dissertation?
It is yet to be decided whether StRs will have a university / externally supervised MSc reviewed by the ARCP panel alone or whether an FOM panel still needs to opine on whether the submission is deemed adequate. For StRs the issue is not to overload ARCP panels who will have a couple of days to pre-read multiple portfolios. For CESR it seems likely that Dr Spiro and his assessors will have more time to review a dissertation and form a judgement. Where there is doubt, Dr Sprio and his team will be able to refer within FOM for additional support and guidance. This activity would be ‘soaked up’ under existing fees structures. It is expected that a ‘dissertation for purpose’ (supervised by FOM rather than by another academic body) will still attract fees. At present, there is no specific activity underway looking at fee structures.
It is stated that a dissertation can be in any subject. I presume that means any medical specialty?
Clearly medical research or scientific subject matter is more likely to satisfy medical training criteria and implicit the intent behind the new curriculum in being able to apply the principles of evidence-based practice. A dissertation on a topic with no link to medicine will satisfy far fewer medical training criteria. Skills that are appropriate to some specialties may not have relevance to OM practice. Each submission is judged on its individual merit.
It is stated that publications in peer reviewed journals might be acceptable for demonstrating research learning outcomes. Can these publications be in subjects that are not OM, and do I need to be 1st author?
As per question 2, skills that are appropriate to some specialties may not have relevance to OM practice. For example, conducting a randomised, controlled placebo drug trial will tick some, but not all OM training requirements. It is not necessary to be 1st author; but 2nd author / collaborator status is likely to erode the degree of contribution to the research question. Again, each case will be judged on its individual merit.
How can I map activities / work I am currently undertaking and logging in the FOM’s ePortfolio to the new learning outcomes / professional capabilities of the 2022 curriculum?
If you are are aligning your evidence with the OMST 2022 Curriculum, FOM has created an easy-to-use mapping tool in Excel Format and a short video providing guidance on how to use it. This can be found in the curriculum section of the FOM website [1]
Q&A took place October 2022