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Entrustable professional activities in postgraduate psychiatric training

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2024

Ioana Varvari ,
Venugopal Duddu  and
Gopinath Ranjith Open the ORCID record for Gopinath Ranjith [Opens in a new window]
Ioana Varvari
Affiliation:
Clinical Fellow in treatment resistant schizophrenia at Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust, Oxford, UK and was previously a Medical Education Fellow at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK.
Venugopal Duddu
Affiliation:
Consultant psychiatrist at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust, Blackburn, UK and was previously the Director of Medical Education at Lancashire and South Cumbria Foundation NHS Trust, Preston, UK.
Gopinath Ranjith*
Affiliation:
Consultant liaison psychiatrist and Director of Postgraduate Medical Education at South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK.
*
Correspondence Dr Gopinath Ranjith. Email: [email protected]
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Summary

Entrustable professional activities (EPAs) have gained traction in the medical education field as a means of assessing competencies. Essentially, an EPA is a profession-specific task that a trainee is entrusted to conduct unsupervised, once deemed competent by their supervisor through prior evaluations and discussions. The integration of EPAs into postgraduate assessment strategies enhances the delivery of capability-based curricula. It strategically bridges the theoretical–practical divide and addresses existing issues associated with workplace-based assessments (WBPAs). This article aims to (a) provide an overview of EPAs, (b) review the application of EPAs in postgraduate psychiatry so far, exploring their conceptual framework, implementation, qualities and potential benefits and concerns, and (c) propose a theoretical framework for their integration into the UK psychiatry curriculum.

Keywords

Entrustable professional activitiescurriculumassessmenttrainingpostgraduate psychiatry
Type
Article
Information
BJPsych Advances , First View , pp. 1 - 13
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Royal College of Psychiatrists

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