All anaesthetists should receive non-clinical training and education, which should be reflected in job plans and job planning. The list of topics should be agreed by the department according to local need, but is likely to cover management, education, EDI and communication skills.
Standards of accommodation for doctors in training should be adhered to.29 Where a consultant or other autonomously practising anaesthetist is required to be resident, on-call accommodation should be provided.29
Many procedures do not have to be performed out of hours.32 Anaesthetists and surgeons together should devise departmental protocols for the handling of patients requiring urgent procedures, to allow prioritisation from both surgical and anaesthetic perspectives.
The RCoA and Association of Anaesthetists currently do not support enhanced roles for AAs until the statutory regulation for AAs is in place. Where such role enhancement exists or is proposed, responsibility should be defined by local governance arrangements.3
Trauma and orthopaedic surgery should be included in anaesthetic departmental audit programmes, including ongoing audit of complications and adverse events. The trauma anaesthetists should have provision in their job plan to attend trauma MDT meetings for discussion regarding high risk patients.
