The General Medical Council (GMC) has submitted its response to Professor Gillian Leng’s independent review of the physician associate (PA) and anaesthesia associate (AA) professions in England.
In its submission the regulator emphasised the importance of statutory regulation for PA and AAs because - as with any regulated healthcare profession - PAs and AAs undertake complex work that will pose some level of risk to the public, and regulation mitigates this risk.
The submission also highlighted that, as the multi-professional regulator for doctors, PAs and AAs, the GMC is well placed to work with others across the health system to identify and address issues that concern all three professions. For example, the availability of supervisors and student training placements.
The GMC also said that regulation is already beginning to raise standards of practice through ensuring that only those individuals with the right clinical knowledge and skills are entered onto the GMC’s registers.
Since regulation began in December 2024 the GMC has received over 2,500 completed registration applications which represent approximately 47% of PAs and 61% of AAs on the voluntary registers. The GMC has registered 1,658 PAs and 70 AAs, and these numbers are expected to grow over the coming months. And there are also over 1,500 applications in progress which have not yet been completed.
The regulator has been reviewing all PA and AA curricula and courses to make sure they meet its standards and the GMC’s Council will make the first decisions about which courses are formally approved this month. If the GMC does not have assurance that a course meets all its required standards it will recommend attaching conditions to that approval, or not recommend them for approval at all. In these cases, the GMC will work with course providers through a targeted action plan to address any concerns within an agreed timeframe.
Charlie Massey, the Chief Executive and Registrar of the GMC, said: "We welcome the opportunity to respond to the Leng Review, as an important step towards addressing some of the concerns about PA and AA roles and their deployment.
"Regulation plays a central role in promoting public confidence in PAs and AAs. Since we began regulating these professions, we have already seen some early benefits in a short period of time. We are making good progress towards having a significant number of PAs and AAs registered and we look forward to helping many more achieve registration in the months to come.
"It is essential that a system wide approach is taken to the ongoing deployment and development of PAs and AAs and that they are supported to practise safely, effectively and ethically."
The GMC’s full submission to the Leng review is available here.
