Can you film patients without telling them?

Well the answer is, of course a resounding no, and even more so in a number of simple scenarios and clinical situations which are covered by the new guidelines on the making of patient audio/visual recordings. So the UKs General Medical Council, are issuing new advice to doctors which comes into effect on the 9th of May 2011 for the United Kingdom. The guidance relates to the making of audio or visual recording in the UK. This updates previous guidance and intends to cover the audio and visual recording of patients, the general principles of which are of course  intended for doctors but highly relevant to doctors in training.

GMC guidance from May 2011 on audio and visual records for patients

Helpful excerpts include advice regarding materials for teaching, patients who lack capacity, radiology and endoscopic images, and covert recording of patients by doctors. They include advice such as the following on radiographs:

You may disclose or use any of the recordings listed in paragraph 10 for secondary purposes without seeking consent provided that, before use, the recordings are anonymised; for example, by the removal or coding of any identifying marks such as writing in the margins of an X-ray (see paragraph 17).

The guidance is complex, and the excerpt above can only be taken in the context of the complete document: you can read a PDF of the guidance here, or visit the web pages here.

This is of particular importance to medical students who have a blog, use Twitter and Facebook, and sometimes write reports about their day to day practices: be careful. It supplements the already heavy advice from the GMC on patient confidentiality, ethics, and both formal and informal advice from Medical Indemnity organisations such as the MPS (see their article on ‘tweeting into trouble’ here).

A contributor for Medical Educator is quoted as follows:

This is of course particularly important for students as well as doctors: there are lots of anxieties, for example for using an anonymised chest radiograph for teaching purposes, by a doctor, under the guidance is ‘definitely’ allowed, however the guidance also provides useful information for those considering making audiovisual recordings in different settings. The advice is complex, intended for practising doctors, and carefully tip-toes through what is an ethical minefield. Our advice to any student is: always follow trust and University guidelines, read the GMC guidance, and when it comes to recording any medical images, you should always have the full support and first hand documented supervision of the clinician responsible for the patient prior to considering any audio/ visual recording. In general, unless you are absolutely certain, your GP or consultant is watching you (and documenting it), and you have informed written consent from a competent patient, we suggest keep your iPhone in your pocket and out of the clinic room!

Remember you can listen to more podcasts, get MCQs and EMQs, watch clinical skills videos, and download ‘one minute’ revision guides in the medical finals login area of the site.

The overall average score of medical students on MedicalEducator.

The following weeks will represent the culmination of years of hard work by medical students over the past 1-5 years. Revision patterns have been changing and increasingly medical students are approaching final examinations preparing for them using web based MCQ, OSCE and video guides. For the first time, resources like podcasts and the like have taken a firm footing in the medical students preparation for final examinations.

One technique of sitting mock written papers has long been popular. Short answer questions, EMQ and MCQ format questions help people to prepare.

To quote one of our contributors:

I always felt more comfortable preparing for any exam, and I mean any, by running through exactly what I should know, first from a theoretical perspective, then from a practical perspective. If that meant filling in multiple choice questions, I got a book on multiple choice questions. It was what it was.

Maybe you’d like the opportunity to measure yourself against other medical students across the UK or

The average mark in one of our mock final examinations, which was added to the site in April 09.

across the world. A good example of this is our *(tough) mock medical finals paper. This is designed for students sitting year 1, year 2, year 3 year 4 or final examinations, which have a clinical component.

The average for this exam is 49.6%. Tough. But will it help you learn? A comment from a subscriber:

You keep doing questions where a principle that you didn’t understand is explained in the answer. Thats the value of them.

Overall this is a stressful time for medical students, on behalf of the Medical Educator team, good luck in those examinations.