Lungs at Work

Professor Joanna Szram

Learning to speak up and to learn differently

Editorial

We are delighted to introduce an issue of FHJ in which we have focused our minds, and hopefully those of our readers, on the ever-present activity of all clinicians (and humans) – learning. This is such a wide topic, so we have considered a number of different dimensions with the confidence that these will stimulate interest, debate and discussion. Firstly, we have considered the important issue of learning to speak up in our workplaces.

Pandemic times: Learning well in a time of COVID-19

Editorial

When we conceived of the theme of ‘learning well’ for the June 2020 issue of FHJ, it is safe to say that the world was a different place. Our thinking around how to utilise education as a method of promoting improved self-care, wellbeing and belonging within a stretched healthcare system was based on current cultural philosophies of civility, preventing moral injury and burnout, and ensuring that healthcare professionals could be empowered – through autonomy and competence – to learn without blame from even the most challenging of situations.

Professor Joanna Szram

Consultant in Occupational Lung Disease

Professor Jo Szram trained and worked in Cambridge, Peterborough, Leicester, Nottingham and London.

She is a consultant respiratory physician specialising in occupational lung disease at Royal Brompton Hospital and honorary senior clinical lecturer at the National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College London. She has been Postgraduate Dean for Kent, Surrey and Sussex since July 2022 and is currently co-chair of the UK’s Medical and Dental Recruitment Service (MDRS) Recruitment Group. She previously worked as a clinical advisor for the national NHS medical education reform programme, leading on the enhance (Enhancing Generalist Skills) and Flexible Portfolio Training (FPT) programmes. Jo was Chair of Medical Education Leaders UK from 2020-22 and was at the forefront of the rebranding initiative from NACT UK.

Jo was Royal College of Physicians’ Linacre Fellow from 2020-22, a role focused on the development and leadership of the RCP’s network of college tutors and associate college tutors, linking their work to that of the Medical Students and Foundation Doctors network, Trainees and New Consultants Committees.

Her work on the editorial board of the RCP’s Future Healthcare Journal provided the opportunity to influence the evolution of the publication as a way to empower all, particularly early career healthcare professionals, to demonstrate what they have learnt, and spread and share their knowledge widely.

The GMC national training survey: Does it have an impact?

Article

The General Medical Council (GMC) national trainee survey (NTS) monitors junior doctor training experience annually, which is then used by organisations such as Health Education England to inform quality management. Its validity as an assessment of the learning environment to drive improvement is frequently questioned; currently there are no published evidence-based studies to demonstrate its impact. To explore the effects of the GMC survey, we carried out a retrospective cohort study using publicly available GMC NTS survey data.