Physician associates (PAs) can continue to practise without registration until December 2026 according to a new timeline laid out by the General Medical Council (GMC), Pulse reports.
Although registration opens on 16 December only ‘a small number’ will be invited to register by the end of this year, chief executive Charlie Massey wrote in an open letter to royal colleges last week.
PAs and AAs aren’t legally required to register until December 2026.
Earlier this month the British Medical Association (BMA) committed its financial support to a legal challenge to the GMC over its alleged failure to distinguish PAs from doctors. The Doctor’s Association UK committed £30,000 to the same case last month.
Last summer the BMA launched its own legal action for a judicial review against the council for its use of the phrase ‘medical professionals’ to describe the PA role. Last year, the union published the results of a survey that found the majority of doctors felt PAs posed a ‘significant’ risk to patient safety.
Dr Richard Fieldhouse, NASGP chair, said: “If a fully qualified doctor was found to be practising without GMC registration, it’d be national headlines, with the perpetrator charged for a criminal offence and behind bars you can say ‘tick here for QOF points’..
“The first thought here is about patient safety. Does the person who calls themself a physician associate actually have the right training and qualifications to be treating patients? And where does this leave the registered doctor who is supervising this person?
“Every patient has the right to be treated by a suitably qualified, registered clinician, and if that care fails, to then be protected by a robust governance and assurance process that is locked in by a regulatory body with the power to protect patients.
“Allowing this delay in regulation not only lets patients down, but undermines the whole sense and purpose of having a regulatory body in the first place.”