Te Kaunihera Rata o Aotearoa | Medical Council of New Zealand (MCNZ) and Te Whatu Ora – Health New Zealand (Te Whatu Ora) developed with the Council of Medical Colleges a draft proposed updated Communication protocol for Accreditation of Specialist Medical Training Settings in AoNZ. The protocol outlines the roles, responsibilities, and communication mechanisms between the parties – MCNZ, Te Whatu Ora, and those specialist medical colleges which choose to sign. The work on the Protocol arose from concerns from the colleges and the New Zealand Resident Doctors’ Association about the ongoing risk of loss of training positions.
The primary role and focus for MCNZ is protecting the public by ensuring high quality training, focusing on the system working properly, at one step removed from the interests of a particular facility. Te Whatu Ora is looking to normalise escalation of problems, require reporting of all notifications, and standardise processes on a national basis. All parties agreed it is important issues are escalated effectively by each party before an impasse is reached. A named position within each organisation will be established as the contact point, potentially at two levels within Te Whatu Ora.
For RACS the benefit of this work is clear line of sight within Te Whatu Ora, being able to escalate nationally when issues are not being dealt with at sites, as it is currently hard for colleges to access the local escalation processes.
RACS provided feedback on the draft Protocol; key points being:
• The unique matter for RACS (amongst the medical colleges) is the involvement of the surgical specialist societies which co-ordinate, action and attend accreditation visits. Whilst societies are not individually parties to the protocol, their roles and responsibilities should be included.
• Agreement with the principle: The withdrawal of accreditation from a setting should be a last resort with colleges, HNZ and MCNZ endeavouring to resolve issues in a manner that minimises adverse impacts on service provision the training, wellbeing and education of trainees, and service provision.
• Whilst the draft Protocol was developed for medical training accreditation in public hospitals and health facilities, we will need to consider extension to cover private facilities where significant public work is outsourced or undertaken for ACC. The cost and fees for accreditation of private facilities will need to be considered.
• All supervisors and trainees being required to have access to and undergo appropriate training in cultural safety, cultural competency, and Te Tiriti o Waitangi.
We will be involved in further joint work to finalise the Protocol.