Flexible Portfolio Training

Flexible Portfolio Training (FPT) was launched as a pilot initiative within higher specialty training offered jointly by Health Education England (HEE) and the Royal College of Physicians, protecting 1 day a week (or 20% time equivalent) for professional development in one of four pathways:

• Clinical informatics pathway
• Medical education pathway
• Clinical Service Improvement (formerly the Quality improvement pathway)
• Research pathway

The pilot phase of FPT has now concluded and management of the scheme has now transferred fully to HEE. 

HEE would like to express its thanks to the Royal College of Physicians for all their work on FPT and for their continued support of the scheme. We would also like to thank regional leads and their teams, educators and trainees for their commitment to this programme and for helping to demonstrate its viability as a training option.

Background

Flexible portfolio training came from Health Education England’s working group on Enhancing Junior Doctors’ Working Lives. This group was established in 2016 to address issues impacting doctors in training and specifically their quality of life. The scheme stemmed from the experiences of previous medical registrars, who felt protected time for professional development would improve the quality of their training.

FPT is one approach to meet the demand for flexible working, while also supporting hard to recruit specialties in hard to fill areas. Each region has separate requirements and therefore FPT looks a little different in each area.

Expansion of the FPT programme

In 2023, FPT will begin to become available across other specialties. Please contact your local HEE office to see which specialties are offering FPT in your area.

Aims of the FPT programme

FPT aims to:

• improve patient care
• improve morale and wellbeing
• protect against burnout
• respond to the desire to train flexibly
• promote non-clinical professional development and portfolio careers
• improve recruitment and retention of medical registrars
• develop well-rounded clinicians
• benefit trusts with service improvement and innovation

Details of the FPT programme

The training scheme is an opportunity for doctors in training to engage in meaningful project work that will benefit their non-clinical professional development. It acts as the perfect complement to clinical training, providing protected time away from clinical medicine to pursue other avenues.

A flexible portfolio trainee’s non-clinical day will be focused on one of four pathways:

• Clinical informatics pathway
• Medical education pathway
• Clinical Service Improvement (formerly the Quality improvement pathway)
• Research pathway

Each pathway is made up of six capabilities, underpinned by descriptors, and followed by illustrative professional activities that might be used to evidence the outcome descriptors.

Pathways describe a structured framework of activities a trainee might sample and undertake developing a range of experiences and are not intended to be exhaustive in their implementation.

The pathways accommodate trainees entering with a wide range of prior experience. Trainees will spend a minimum of one year on their pathway, with the option to continue for the duration of their higher specialty training (subject to satisfactory progress and Annual Review of Competence Progression outcome).