The Royal College of Physicians (RCP) has hosted a workshop at its Regent’s Park home in London to explore how doctors can be better supported to lead meaningful improvement in patient care.
The event focused on reclaiming improvement as a core professional activity for doctors, one that is practical, achievable alongside clinical work, and firmly grounded in improving patients’ experience of care.
Clinicians, educators and improvement leaders met at the RCP in London on 20 March for a fullday workshop focused on a core question: how can doctors be better supported to lead meaningful improvement in patient care? The workshop brought together a wide mix of perspectives – from resident doctors and consultants to improvement specialists, patient representatives and medical educators – to explore how improvement is understood, taught and put into practice across the NHS.
Throughout the day, participants reflected on a shared challenge: while doctors remain deeply committed to their patients and clinical work, many feel increasingly constrained in their ability to drive change. The workshop set out to reclaim improvement as a core professional activity: something that doctors are empowered and supported to do, rather than an additional burden.
A central theme was the importance of designing improvement resources around the realities of those who use them. Complex tools and frameworks can become a barrier to improvement, especially when people have very different levels of experience, confidence and capacity.
Enabling clinicians to make meaningful changes and giving them the permission, skills and support to do so was seen as essential. Frameworks should be flexible, digitally enabled and capable of supporting both smallscale local improvement and larger transformational change. This means:
- a simple and adaptable improvement approach
- bitesized learning that fits around clinical work
- coaching and mentoring, including peer support
- case studies that show how improvement works in practice
- clear guidance rather than rigid, onesizefitsall models.
Reflecting on the day, Dr Aklak Choudhury, RCP clinical director for improvement, said:
‘It was a privilege to host the RCP improvement approach workshop earlier this month, bringing together colleagues with Professor John Clarkson and Professor James Ward from the University of Cambridge Centre for Engineering Better Care. We also welcomed insights from Professor Amar Shah, national clinical director for improvement who shared with us the key ingredients for effective improvement. The day was framed with presentations from our resident doctors and consultants describing the lived experience of improvement in healthcare.’
‘Over time, the identity of resident doctors as improvers has eroded. Faced with competing clinical priorities, many lack the time and headspace for improvement work, while shortened training rotations undermine continuity and a sense of belonging. Poor alignment between curricula, shortlisting criteria and NHS systems has too often reduced quality improvement to a “tickbox” exercise, compounded by fragmented training, limited coaching and variable access to organisational knowledge and data.
‘Doctors must effectively participate in sustainable improvement and audit, supported by wider multidisciplinary teams. Only then can we sustain the highest clinical standards for our patients.’