FFICM and FRCA Examinations

13 March 2020

FFICM Examinations

Considering the impact of this situation on the FFICM examinations, in conjunction with the RCoA Examinations Department who kindly run our examination diets, we have taken the difficult decision to postpone the FICM OSCE/SOE, scheduled for 20–22 April. These dates unfortunately are likely to fall just inside the predicted peak period for the outbreak.

We understand that this will be disappointing news, but it is a unique and unavoidable situation. We do not take the cancellation of examinations lightly and therefore have considered all options before taking this decision.

All candidates booked on the April examination will be contacted separately and will receive a full refund of the exam fees. Other expenses incurred cannot be refunded. We are investigating dates and resources for a revised sitting, to take place later in the year, likely attached to the October sitting (19–21 October), and this will be published in due course.  If you are affected by this postponement, please contact the Examinations Department directly on exams@rcoa.ac.uk

FRCA Examinations

The Royal College of Anaesthetist has carefully considered the potential impact on our examinations (FRCA, FFPM, FFICM). Regretfully we have had to make the difficult decision to postpone all examinations until the autumn. We will be contacting candidates individually with more details.  We will also be advising schools that trainees should be allowed to progress through the training programme without having passed exams as an exceptional measure.

We are also considering how to manage the forthcoming ST3 recruitment round in the light of the potential challenges faced by both candidates and panellists.  We will make a decision on this in the next few days so please monitor this website for updates.

We appreciate that all of the above will be extremely worrying for anaesthetists in training at a time when the circumstances in the clinical environment are also very stressful. We hope that it also provides some reassurance around continued training progression.

As has been emphasised elsewhere, we urge everyone to look after their own well being and that of the teams around them during what is likely to be a very difficult period of intensive work.  We will also be writing to trainers to reiterate this point.

Finally, we recommend that all anaesthetists should continue to keep themselves and their departments appraised of developments as they arise.  We would recommend regularly checking for updates on this website.

ENDS