TY - JOUR T1 - The Tooke report: good news for general practice? JF - British Journal of General Practice JO - Br J Gen Pract SP - 234 LP - 235 DO - 10.3399/bjgp08X279742 VL - 58 IS - 549 AU - Steve Field Y1 - 2008/04/01 UR - http://bjgp.org/content/58/549/234.abstract N2 - During the 1960s — when it was still possible to enter general practice immediately after completion of the pre-registration house officer year — the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) sought to improve standards of care for patients by introducing vocational training for general practice.Although the RCGP proposed a 5-year period of vocational training at that time, resource constraints within the NHS meant that only 3-year programmes could be developed, and with only 1 year in general practice itself.Initially voluntary, there was no requirement to undertake any training until 1978 when primary legislation was introduced making it mandatory to complete 12 months in general practice. Subsequent changes to the legislation in 1983 required completion of 3 years' training to become a principal and in 1990 required completion of training to work in any capacity within general practice. Although the majority of trainees took the MRCGP examination, there was no requirement to demonstrate satisfactory completion of training until 1996 when summative assessment became mandatory.The changes brought about by the Postgraduate Medical Education and Training Board (PMETB) gave us the opportunity to develop specialty training for general practice, ensuring that doctors have the competences necessary to provide high standards of medical care for patients.The PMETB set explicit standards for both the training curriculum and the assessment of completion of training that needed to be met by all medical specialties including general practice. The curriculum for general practice1 was given unconditional approval by PMETB. Although the curriculum is competence-rather … ER -