The ARCP Online

An Annual Review of Competence Progression (ARCP) can be conducted entirely on FOM PortfolioBuilder including:

• Registering ARCP reviewers to a school or organisation
• Scheduling an ARCP for a trainee
• Assigning ARCP reviewers to ARCP panels
• Reviewing a trainee's portfolio for ARCP
• Completing an ARCP Outcome Form
• Signing off an ARCP
• Releasing an outcome form to a trainee
• Acknowledgement of an outcome by a trainee

Registering ARCP Reviewers to a School or Organisation

The first step in conducting ARCP reviews online is for deanery administrators to add ARCP reviewers to their school or organisation.

There are four ARCP providers for Occupational Medicine: NHS Education Scotland (NES), National School of Occupational Health (NSOH), Defence Deanery & Northern Ireland Medical & Dental Training Agency (NIMDTA).

When registering ARCP reviewers, we recommend checking with them to see if they are already registered with the system, and if so, what their primary email address is. The primary email address is the email address used to log into the system and is the one that should be used to register reviewers. This ensures no duplicate accounts are created.

Deanery administrators can add ARCP reviewers to their school or organisation or remove ARCP reviewers from their school or organisation as necessary.

Scheduling an ARCP

Each ARCP in the system represents an instance of ARCP in the real world, so an ARCP can be scheduled on a trainee as soon as the review date is known.

Once an ARCP has been scheduled, we would automatically prompt the trainee to ensure their profile is up to date prior to the ARCP Outcome Form being created. Trainees should have a folder for each level of training in their portfolio e.g. ST3, ST4 etc. These folders will have a start and end date specifying the time period they cover. Trainees can see which folders will be included in an ARCP once the ARCP has been scheduled and make amendments if necessary.

If a trainee's portfolio is up to date with all folders in order, the system can compare the ARCP review period with the folders to see which folders should be considered during this review. If a folder overlaps the ARCP review period, the system will use the information contained in that folder to pre-fill some of the questions and an accurate form will be created.

To find out how to schedule an ARCP for a trainee on FOM PortfolioBuilder, read our step-by-step guide: Schedule an ARCP for a trainee

Assigning an ARCP Reviewer to a Panel

ARCP Reviewers registered to a school or organisation get automatic access to all trainees' portfolios 2 weeks prior to their ARCP. It is not essential to assign ARCP reviewers to a panel, but there are some benefits.

• a trainee's ARCP Outcome Form can be pre-filled with the correct details of who was involved in the review.
• The reviewer's dashboard shows a list of trainees who have an ARCP on specified dates.
• If a reviewer has not been added to a panel date, then their dashboard will show that there are reviews scheduled on that date, but that the reviewer has not been assigned to review any trainees on that date. This gives the reviewer the opportunity to raise this if they feel this is not correct.

If there are changes to the ARCP reviewers in attendance on the day of an ARCP, they can be edited on the trainee's ARCP Outcome Form. Reviewers can be checked or unchecked in a section 'List all Panel Members'. If there are any reviewers who have not been registered with a FOM PortfolioBuilder user account, their details can be manually entered into a free text area on the form.

To find out how to assign a reviewer to an ARCP panel on FOM PortfolioBuilder, read our step-by-step guide: Assign a Reviewer to an ARCP Panel

Reviewing a trainee's Portfolio

Once the setup of an online ARCP is complete, ARCP reviewers can use the two weeks up to and including a trainee's ARCP to review the trainee's portfolio.

ARCP panellists will see the names of the trainees they are scheduled to review on the dashboard of their accounts and can click on the names of the trainees access their online portfolios.

To find out more, read our article: Reviewing a Trainee's Portfolio

Completing an ARCP Outcome Form

An ARCP Outcome Form can be created at any time once an ARCP has been scheduled and can be drafted prior to a review date to save time on the day of an ARCP. It also provides an opportunity to identify any issues beforehand and to allow these to be rectified. For example, if a trainee has incomplete information or incorrectly marked-up folder dates.

If there is a significant amount of information missing, the form may be discarded and referred back to the trainee. Once the trainee has resolved any issues with their portfolio, a new form can be generated.

Forms can be created, modified and deleted by anyone involved in the ARCP process, up until such time as it is submitted and signed off. As with all forms in the system, each revision is stored and attributable to a user account.

Submission of a completed ARCP Outcome Form can happen on the ARCP review date or thereafter. The system will check to see that a form is valid and if so will mark it as submitted. If not, any required fields that need completing will be highlighted. Although an ARCP reviewer's access to a trainee's portfolio is revoked the day after the trainee's review, reviewers can still access the trainee's ARCP Outcome Form.

The form can be submitted by any of the panel members or by someone with the relevant permissions.

To find out how to complete an ARCP Outcome Form on FOM PortfolioBuilder, read our step-by-step guide: Complete an ARCP Outcome Form

Signing off an ARCP

Once an ARCP Outcome Form has been submitted it can be signed off. This can be done by the Chair of the Panel or the Postgraduate Dean. It should be accessed directly from the account of the person signing off the form.

The system then shows that the sign-off has been successful. This prevents any further changes to the outcome form. The account holder has the option to remove the sign-off at this stage should the form need to be changed in any way.

To find out how to sign off an ARCP on FOM PortfolioBuilder, read our step-by-step guide: Sign off an ARCP Outcome Form

Can an ARCP reviewer sign-off an ARCP Outcome Form after the date of the review?

Releasing an Outcome to a Trainee

Once an ARCP Outcome Form has been signed off, the deanery administrator can release the outcome to the trainee. This is the last opportunity the deanery has to ensure that all the information is correct on the ARCP Outcome Form before it goes into a trainee's portfolio.

For step-by-step instructions on releasing an ARCP, see our article: Release an ARCP Outcome Form to a Trainee.

Acknowledging an ARCP Outcome

Once an ARCP outcome has been released, trainees can acknowledge this by signing it off from their own account. This will automatically create an ARCP Outcome Form activity in their portfolio. The review can then be seen by others involved in the trainee's training.

Signing off an ARCP would indicate that a trainee understands the recommendations arising from the review. It does not imply that they accept or agree with them. The trainee can still have the recommendation reviewed and still have the right to appeal outcomes 3, 4 and 7.3 as delineated in The Gold Guide, Section 7.

To find out how a trainee can acknowledge an ARCP outcome, read our step-by-step guide: Acknowledge an ARCP outcome

How do I amend an ARCP Outcome Form that has been acknowledged by a trainee?

ARCP timeline & Roles

Here's a visual of the ARCP timeline along with a key to who can perform each ARCP-related task on FOM PortfolioBuilder