The RCGP recommends that your portfolio of supporting information should include all the core elements required by the GMC in a format that is professionally presented, typed so that it is legible, and capable of being transmitted electronically.
NHS England clearly says that, while they require appraisals to be submitted electronically and not on paper, the individual GP should have a choice about which toolkit to use (medical-appraisal-policy-0415, page 15).
The following is a communication from the Londonwide LMCs to all London based GPs regarding freedom of appraisal toolkit choice (27 January 2016 – emphasis added).
Dear Colleague.
As you will know, NHSE funding for the use of the Clarity appraisal toolkit has ceased. Although many of you will pay for and continue to use Clarity, we have been asked to remind you that, should you wish, there are alternative toolkits as well as the free downloadable MAG form.
There is no requirement in the regulations to use any particular vehicle for your appraisal, although it may remain convenient to you to use a toolkit with which you, your appraiser and the responsible officers are familiar.
We recommend that GPs intending to use an alternative inform their appraisers well before their next appraisal date, and check with any alternative supplier the mechanism for transferring previous appraisal data from Clarity.
Yours sincerely
Michelle
Dr Michelle Drage FRCGP
Chief Executive
Londonwide LMCs
Dear Colleagues,
With the recent changes in NHS funding for appraisal toolkits. It is now the respoonsibility of the individual doctor to pay for thier online appraisal and revalidation toolkit.
Common sense dictates that as doctors are going to be paying for their toolkit they should be able to choose whichever appraisal vehicle / toolkit they like – as long as it fulfils all the requirements.
This very helpful NHS guidance:
NHS England guidance on appraisal toolkit choice
clearly states :
‘Whichever vehicle you decide to use, you will be responsible for ensuring that your appraiser has access to your system and understands its functionality. You must also ensure that your appraisal information complies with the Medical Appraisal Guide and is available in a format that permits it to be uploaded to the RMS. In terms of this latter point, if your appraisal can be downloaded as a pdf or Word document, this will be acceptable.’
So you are free to use whatever appraisal toolkit you like. With a range of innovative features we feel that GP Tools should be your first choice. Our ‘easy as email’ approach and ability to fulfil all NHS England requirements make us the ‘go to’ vehicle for medical appraisals.
Dear Colleagues,
From the 1st of January 2016 through to the end of the year, if you are coming over from the _____ toolkit then we will give you a year’s GP Tools subscription completely free when you join.
All you have to do is email our support team with any documentation from the _____ toolkit showing that they are demanding £££ from you.
Unfortunately, you will have to use your imagination to figure out what we mean by the _____ toolkit; their solicitors have warned us not to mention the _____ toolkit in any way or we will be taken to court.
Next time: ‘How to import your data from the _____ toolkit!’.
Happy joining GP Tools
As you are all aware by now, London NHS regions will no longer be funding any apprasial and revalidation toolkits from April 2016.
To celebrate this decision, we are going to offer 1 year complimentary subscriptions to a randomly selected group of 100 London GPs.
Remember that we do not take any payment details from you upon signing up.
Our rates are £39.99 per year and we also include a patient survey report in that price. So a potential saving of £50 on top of our reduced prices.
Give us a try, you never know you might be the lucky recipient of a free subscription.
Happy joining GP Tools !
After some great feedback by users we have now enabled appraisal feedback for everyone.
After you have completed your appraisal disucssion documentation you may complete and send feedback directly to your appraisal team.
Again, keeping in line with our mottto ‘as easy as email’ it only takes a few minutes to complete the feedback and helps the appraisal team understand and imporve the process.
First of all a big happy new year to all our users. You have truly contributed with your suggestions and feedback to make GP Tools an incredible way to record appraisal information.
Congratulations to the thousands who have been revalidated using GP Tools in 2013.
We are also looking forward to welcoming Nurses to our sister site in 2014. The amount of requests we have had from the nursing community is simply phenomenal and we are working hard to design an ‘easy as email’ appraisal and revalidation system for them to use.
Stay tuned as we have a number of new partnerships and unique ideas we are sure you will love.
May you have a happy and prosperous new year 🙂
We are proud to announce that our new iPhone application is available to download on the iTunes store. We have taken great care to ensure that it fulfils our criteria of being as easy to use as email. Please let us know what you think of it.
Wow ! What an amazing year GP Tools has had. We have grown our user base by over 300%(!), and have been accepted as the revalidation toolkit of choice by a number of PCOs up and down the country. In addition, we have implemented many new and innovative features that you will not find anywhere else.
Frankly, if you are struggling with using the “old & outdated” toolkits you have no excuse not to start using GPTools.
Stay tuned as we have a number of new partnerships and unique ideas we are sure you will love.
May you have a happy and prosperous new year 🙂
I just read an excellent post by 37signal’s Jason Fried, called
‘Competing on easy.’
To quote, ” I like to make things easier for people. I love competing on easy. I find easy to be the most personally rewarding, too. It has such direct impact. When something is easier, you feel it. You’ve done it the hard way before, so when you experience the easy way you immediately know the difference. Easy feels like a cold Coke on a hot day. It’s just so satisfying. The harder it’s been – the thirstier you are – the better it tastes, too. Another thing about easy – it’s personal. “Thank you” is often a response you hear when you make something easier for someone. Easier is appreciated.”
At GPTools we are proud to say we also ‘compete on easy’ and that is what drives us. Try us and you’ll realize how easy appraisal and revalidation can be.