Training policies
Most of the regulations and procedures which apply to higher specialist training are found in A Guide to Specialist Registrar Training, informally known as the Orange Book, produced by the NHS Executive.
It is available on the Department of Health website.
Regulations and procedures applicable to trainees commencing specialty training from 1 August 2007 are set out in the First and Second Edition of Department of Health's A Guide to Specialty Training in the UK - The Gold Guide.
Training Departments
Each region and Training Department has a written training policy which prescribes the structure of an acceptable training programme and/or location. This policy will include:
- arrangements for academic and service supervision,
- provision for trainer development,
- facilities expected in a training location,
- induction programmes for new trainees,
- requirements for learning frameworks (contracts),
- on-call arrangements,
- opportunities for external attachments,
- arrangements for rotation between training locations,
- study leave,
- and performance assessment and review processes.
National Training Number (NTN)
Trainees who have been appointed to a substantive training post will be issued a unique training number by the postgraduate dean. This is their National Training Number (NTN).
There are variations on this number for trainees in particular categories; e.g. those in fixed-term specialist training appointments (FTSTA), an FTN, and those on research programmes, an RTN.
Dual Accreditation
There are at present no dual accreditation programmes in public health. The key factor with such programmes is that they must be in place when the trainee commences training. FPH have developed a framework for the development of the approaches to Dual Accreditation and modular credentialing. This can be found here.
