You are in > manchester.com  > News > Call for British doctors to pass national licence

Health

Call for British doctors to pass national licence

14/02/2008

British doctors should not be licensed until they pass a national examination, it was claimed on Thursday.

An article published in the BMC Medicine journal cites discrepancies in pass rates in existing qualifications as evidence for the need for a national standard.

Researchers led by Dr IC McManus of University College London (UCL) arrived at their findings by assessing the performance of 5,827 medical graduates from 19 UK universities.

The students were evaluated on results in the Membership of the Royal Colleges of Physicians exam (MRCP UK), which forms a "critical" part of aspiring specialist doctors' training.

"The General Medical Council (GMC) has explored the possibility of a national medical licensing examination in the UK, as exists in the US," Dr McManus writes.

"Our study provides a strong argument for introducing one, as we have shown that graduates from different medical schools perform markedly differently in terms of their knowledge, clinical and communication skills."

In the research, 83 per cent of students from Oxford and Cambridge universities passed the first part of the MRCP UK, compared to 32 per cent of graduates from Liverpool University.

But the researchers stress academic institutions were not the only contributing factor.

Dr McManus concluded: "Although the MRCP (UK) is a widely-regarded exam that is carefully designed to assess a wide range of knowledge and skills required by a physician, it is possible that some medical schools teach other important skills that this examination does not assess.

"However, our data do show that there is a real need for routine collection and audit of performance data of UK medical graduates, both in postgraduate exams such as the MRCP (UK) and probably also by a national licensing exam."

Commenting on the study, a Department of Health spokesperson said: "Undergraduate medicine is a matter for medical schools and the GMC."