The Faculty of Physician Associates (FPA) at the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) provides professional support to physician associates across the UK. The FPA will close in December 2024. Read more.
Page updated September 2024.
The FPA’s role has comprised reviewing and setting standards for:
- the education and training of physician associates
- accreditation of university programmes and
- physician associate national certification.
The FPA manages the Physician Associate Managed Voluntary Register (PAMVR). The GMC will assume registration and regulation responsibilities for PAs from December 2024 and the PAMVR will subsequently close.
What is a physician associate?
Physician associates (PAs) are healthcare professionals with a generalist medical education, who work under the supervision of doctors as part of the multidisciplinary healthcare team.
What do physician associates do?
Physician associates can:
- take medical histories from patients
- carry out physical examinations
- formulate differential diagnoses and management plans
- perform diagnostic and therapeutic procedures
- develop and deliver appropriate treatment and management plans
- request and interpret diagnostic studies (except those involving ionising radiation)
- provide health promotion and disease prevention advice for patients.
Physician associates are not able to:
- prescribe
- request ionising radiation (eg chest X-ray or CT scan)
- provide care or treatments to patients in an unsupervised setting.
What is the relationship between physician associates and their supervisors?
Physician associates are dependent practitioners working with a dedicated consultant supervisor.
PAs are responsible for their actions and decisions. However, the clinician who is ultimately responsible for the patient is the consultant.
As a clinical supervisor there is also a responsibility for ongoing development of the PA, including appraisal and development of a professional development plan (PDP).
How do physician associates fit into the NHS workforce?
Physician associates have been working in the UK for 20 years, so are relatively new members on clinical teams. Physician associates' ability to contribute to the multidisciplinary healthcare team is enabled by collaboration and supportive working relationships with their clinical supervisors (consultants), meaning that there must always be someone senior who can discuss cases, give advice, and attend to patients if necessary.
Physician associates can be found working in primary and secondary care throughout the UK.
Why did the RCP agree to establish the FPA?
The RCP established the Faculty of Physician Associates (FPA) in 2015 in conjunction with the UK Association of Physician Associates (UKAPA) and Health Education England (HEE) in order to develop the working relationship between doctors, across the specialties, with physician associates.
The faculty’s aim has been to support the development of physician associates and thereby enhance patient safety, by providing access to educational and professional development resources. The FPA is a national body, so standards applied across the UK.
In the absence of formal regulation, the FPA has run the Physician Associate Managed Voluntary Register (PAMVR). The faculty and the RCP have campaigned to achieve statutory regulation of the PA profession.
How are qualified physician associates able to practise in the UK?
Physician associates are able to practise in the UK as a result of a clause within the General Medical Council's guidance on good medical practice.
Delegation is discussed within paragraph 44–45 as follows:
44. You must contribute to the safe transfer of patients between healthcare providers and between health and social care providers. This means you must:
- share all relevant information with colleagues involved in your patients’ care within and outside the team, including when you hand over care as you go off duty, and when you delegate care or refer patients to other health or social care providers 8,14
- check, where practical, that a named clinician or team has taken over responsibility when your role in providing a patient’s care has ended. This may be particularly important for patients with impaired capacity or who are vulnerable for other reasons.
45. When you do not provide your patients’ care yourself, for example when you are off duty, or you delegate the care of a patient to a colleague, you must be satisfied that the person providing care has the appropriate qualifications, skills and experience to provide safe care for the patient.
What experience do physician associates have before training?
All physician associates hold at least a bachelor's degree, usually in a life science field (biomedical science or a health-related science degree). Most physician associate programmes require at least a 2:1 honours degree for entry into the postgraduate diploma course along with some prior health or social care experience. In addition to their first degree the prior experience of physician associates is diverse, ranging from cardiac physiology and psychology to pharmacy and health education.
Can physician associates prescribe in the UK?
Physician associates are not permitted to prescribe medication in the UK.
Physician associates may gain prescribing responsibilities at some point in the future once statutory regulation is introduced. As physician associates are not yet licensed or regulated, this limitation also applies to requests for X-rays and other ionising radiation requests.
Can doctors who trained abroad work in the UK as physician associates?
International medical graduates have not completed an approved physician associate training programme, and so are not eligible to work as a physician associate. Anyone wishing to become a physician associate must complete the entire physician associate programme and pass the national examinations.
How much do physician associates earn?
The newly qualified physician associate post has been evaluated by the NHS under Agenda for Change at band 7.