Professional Competence

Since May 1st 2011, all doctors who hold Specialist, General or Supervised registration with the Medical Council and practise for more than 30 days a year in Ireland, are legally obliged to enrol in a Professional Competence Scheme (PCS) and meet the requirements set by the Medical Council. This involves engaging in CPD activity, and recording/retaining supporting documentation relating to your CPD activities.

ICO is responsible for operating the scheme for medical and surgical eye specialists.

Learn more by downloading our Guide to PCS (PDF)

The Professional Competence Scheme year runs from May 1 to April 30.

Professional Competence has two key components:

• (1) Continuing Professional Development (CPD); and,
• (2) Clinical / Practice Audit.

CPD is measured in hours with each full hour of educational activity = 1 CPD credit. 

PCS requires year-on-year compliance; there is no mechanism to ‘carry forward’ credits or competence from year to year.

1. Continuing Professional Development (CPD)

Doctors are required to undertake and record the following CPD activity with their Scheme:

In the current year 2023-2024, Doctors must accumulate 40 CPD credits. 

The  40 CPD credits can be recorded across any of the below categories:

• External (maintenance of knowledge and skills) 
• Internal (practice evaluation and development)
• Personal Learning 
• Research and Teaching 

2. Clinical Practice Audit or Quality Improvement Project

An audit of practice or quality improvement project must be completed.

The purpose of the audit is to establish if best practice is being adhered to for quality assurance and improvement purposes.

If your audit or quality improvement audit spans over two PCS years, record it in the year you completed majority of work.

The Medical Council provide useful video resources for Clinical/Practice Audit guidance:

https://www.medicalcouncil.ie/News-and-Publications/Videos/Clinical-Audit-Guides/Clinical-Audit-Guides.html

Presuming that the audit or improvement project takes 10 hours, This brings the annual requirements to 50 hours of CPD activity.

For guidance on Continuing Professional Development and the Clinical / Practice Audit, please consult the ICO Guide to PCS 

The ICO is using the PCS Account developed by the RCSI which aims to support you in meeting the PCS requirements and allow you to easily record your professional competence activity.

Once enrolled, you can view your PCS Account dashboard at any time by logging into PCS on a PC, tablet or mobile device:

Evidence of attendance at educational activities is required and should be uploaded to your PCS Account should they be required for validation audit purposes. You are encouraged to keep your CPD activity records up-to-date.

To enrol on the ICO PCS Scheme please follow this link

1. Press the 'enrol' tab
2. Fill in the online application form, giving details of your qualifications, Medical Council number and current post
3. Pay the fee €250 annually (a reduced fee is payable by ICO members)
4. Submit online application and await confirmation of enrolment
5. Record CPD and Audit activity

Supports:

• How to Upload Records
• How to Access PCS via Smartphone
• How to Download your Statement
• How to Clone a Record
• Maintaining Professional Competence
  • How to Enrol: Page 19
  • Forgot/Change Your Password: Page 55
  • How to Paye your PCS Fee: Page 59

 

The ICO has developed Guides and Templates for our members to aid both understanding of the PCS requirements and to reduce the administrative burden of having to create documents to evidence activity. Please refer to these at the start of the PCS year as they may answer any questions you have or help you plan for the year ahead.

ICO Online Journal Club

The introduction of the ICO Online Journal Club is aimed at further supporting members with online learning opportunities. Time spent reading the articles can be recorded for personal learning points for the professional competence scheme.

Members can access these resources by logging in to the ICO membership portal here and visiting the Professional Competence page.

 

How You Choose Your Learning

As a PCS participant, you have the opportunity to shape your learning. PCS activity should be meaningful to your educational and practice needs.

Learning Outcomes

The ICO encourages you to focus on the learning outcomes of your activities - What did you learn? How has it helped your practice?

While there are minimum PCS requirements to be met, designing your own learning portfolio and choosing with a learning outcome in mind, will help you build skills that can directly improve your own skills and your workplace.

Eight Domains of Good Professional Practice

There are eight principles on which good practice is founded and set out by the Medical Council.

Referring to the eight Domains of Good Professional Practice will aid you in selecting a diverse range of activities, ensuring you have a balanced professional competence portfolio that encourages best practice.

1. Patient Safety and Quality of Patient Care
2. Relating to Patients
3. Communication and Interpersonal Skills
4. Collaboration and Teamwork
5. Management (including Self-Management)
6. Scholarship
7. Professionalism
8. Clinical Skills

For more information on the eight domains, please visit the Medical Council's webpage on Good Professional Competence.

We also recommend reading the Medical Council guidance on Professional Conduct and Ethics

Annual Statement of Participation

Your Annual Statement of Participation is an important document that has been approved by the Medical Council to show you have a formal record of participation in Professional Competence, as required by the Medical Practitioner's Act. The statement outlines what you have recorded on your PCS Account and will show if you have had your portfolio validated and the result of this process. It will also show if you have reported an absence from practice of three or more months during the PCS year (May to April).

The Medical Council may ask you for evidence of participation in a PCS and you can submit your Annual Statement of Participation as appropriate evidence.

At any time during the PCS year, you can access your statement by logging into your PCS Account.

Annual Planning

You are responsible for developing and implementing your plan for the PCS year, relevant to your roles and responsibilities. Although it’s not compulsory to complete an Annual Plan, the ICO recommends that you do as it can be a useful tool to think about what activities you would like to participate in and to plan dates and leave at the start of the PCS year.

Annual plans are not reviewed or scored – their purpose is to record that you engaged in the activity of planning for the PCS year. Your plan may change during the year, depending on circumstances within your practice, but the ICO advises to create a plan at the beginning of the year so that you can organise the resources you need to participate. There is also an option to complete and upload an Annual Plan Reflection at PCS year end. This is an opportunity to reflect on your overall experience of professional development for the year; highlight what was achieved, what could not be included and what can be learned for the next PCS year.

If you complete and upload an Annual Plan in your PCS Account by 30 September, you can claim 2 credits in the Internal CPD category.

If you complete and upload an Annual Plan Reflection in your PCS Account toward the end of the PCS year and by 30 April at the latest, you can claim 1 credit in the Internal CPD category.

The ICO templates for Annual Plan and Annual Plan Reflection are available to download on the Member’s Portal.  ICO members can login here

ICO PCS Validation Audit

The ICO is required by the Medical Council to carry out an annual validation of activities recorded by doctors participating in a Professional Competence Scheme. Every year a random group of enrolled doctors is selected for validation. The PCS Account record of selected doctors is reviewed to check if they are meeting the minimum requirements of the Scheme. The evidence uploaded to support the activities recorded is also reviewed.

The ICO will contact you if you have been randomly selected and will provide support through the whole process. For more information please consult the ICO Guide to PCS Validation Audit on the Members Portal.

Participation in a validation process is indicated on the Statement of Participation. Please also be aware that the Medical Council will carry out a separate audit of scheme participants every year.

Retired Doctors

There are two categories of retired doctors:

Fully Retired Doctors

If you are no longer seeing patients and not participating in activity that requires registration with the Medical Council, it may be difficult to meet the Professional Competence requirements. If this is the case, you may wish to consider voluntary withdrawal from the Register

Partially Retired Doctors

You occasionally see patients or are engaged in activities that require registration with the Medical Council, e.g. tutoring, teaching, medico-legal work, professional advisor, etc.

From the perspective of patient safety, the responsibility to maintain professional competence applies to all doctors, regardless of their working less than full-time, or on an occasional basis.

Therefore, if you have partially retired you are obliged to fulfill your statutory duty to maintain professional competence and enrol and participate fully in a PCS.

For further information, please visit the Medical Council website. You also may find it useful to contact by phone or email the Medical Council Professional Competence Scheme section.

Consultant CME Fund

The Consultant CME Fund is a scheme open to Consultants employed in the public service. It allows Consultants claim a maximum of €3,000 per year towards courses and conference, reference materials and professional fees.

Further information is available in the HSE Consultant CME Fund guidance document and the application form should be completed in full and returned to the relevant employer for processing.

 

Forum of Postgraduate Medical Training Bodies Frequently Asked Questions Regarding PCS

1. Download as PDF Document
2. Download as Ms Word Document

Prior to applying for CPD recognition, we advise that you please read the Guidelines for Educational Events Approval of CPD Points Process in full.

To apply, you will need to complete all sections of the online application form: ICO Application for CPD Recognition

You will also need to organise the following supporting documents and submit them to siobhan.kelly@eyedoctors.ie

• Medical Organiser’s Declaration (MOD) - Download the form
• Copy of your Invite/Programme for the event
• Copy of your template Post-Event Feedback (that your attendees will complete after the event)

Applications cannot be reviewed unless all instructions on the online form have been followed correctly and all supporting documents have been submitted in good order.

For information on the CPD - Support Scheme please visit https://www.eyedoctors.ie/trainees/CPD_Support_Scheme.asp