Being developed
Our goal here is to make complex educational theory as practical and as accessible as possible for busy medical teachers.
To stimulate you, reduce duplication of work and help add creativity to your educational programme.
path: AUDIO COT
If you have files you would like me to host on here and share with others, OR if you would like to help develop these pages further, then please email me.
rameshmehay@googlemail.co.uk
Let’s start by answering the question “What is it”. An audio-COT is like a COT, but instead of assessing a video consultation, your trainer will assess one of your TELEPHONE consultations (hence the word audio).
General Practice has evolved, and more and more consultations are being carried out by phone. Back in the 1990s 3% of our consultations were via telephone. Now it’s like 20%. Staggering isn’t it? So we hope you can see why it needs to be tested. And many of the things we do can be done over the phone. In the current crisis of patient demand and with newer and better technologies, we need to think about different ways of doing the consultation than the traditional face-to-face way.
Different skills are needed to carry out a consultation safely and appropriately on the phone from those needed for face-to-face consultation. Therefore, introducing audio-COTs means your telephone skills get assessed, and if they get assessed, that means you will be taught how to improve and your skills will get better and better. Now – that can’t be a bad thing can it? And we need to ensure GP training helps trainees perform in a clinically safe and effective way on the telephone.
And finally, you MAY get a telephone consultation case in your CSA – and the audio-COT and subsequent training will help! The usefulness of the audio-COT has been established. Audio-COT is a tool for facilitating learning and assessment of GP trainee telephone consultations.
Actually, if you look closely, there are elements that are very similar. Of course, there are some that will be different because the nature of doing a telephone consultation is different to that of a face-to-face one in parts.
Your GP supervisor (can be a trainer or qualified GP) will review a number of your telephone consultations throughout your GP training in your GP posts.
It is natural for trainees to want to choose telephone consultations in which they feel they have performed well. This isn’t a problem: the ability to discriminate between good and poor consultations indicates professional development. Trainees are reminded that the Audio-COT isn’t a pass/fail exercise: it is part of a wider picture of their overall practice.
It’s simple, work on your telephone consultation skills. To do that…
Yes.
Easy – just look at the document in the DOWNLOADS section called Audio-COT capability linkage.
Got any advice or suggestions? Anything we’ve missed or is inaccurate? Then leave a message below. Got a resource to share? Contact rameshmehay@googlemail.com. ‘Make GP Training Better Together’
FROM 1st July 2022 • DON’T MISS OUT!
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