About the College of Medicine

There is a new force in medicine. A force that brings patients, doctors, nurses and other health professionals together, instead of separating them into tribes.

A force that combines scientific knowledge, clinical expertise and the patient’s own perspective. A force that will re-define what good medicine means − renewing the traditional values of service, commitment and compassion and creating a more holistic, patient-centred, preventative approach to healthcare.

That force is the new College of Medicine. Uniquely, it brings doctors and other health professionals together with patients and scientists.

Patients because it is only by working in partnership with them that health services can deliver real excellence, whether in the clinical care of individuals, or planning and designing healthcare for populations, or in improving public health.

Scientists because their knowledge, expertise and input are vital to provide the evidence needed to inform medicine, to make choices between available treatments − and to understand where evidence is equivocal too.

All health professionals because good medicine is about teams, not about domination by any individual group.

Synergy

No-one has ever before attempted to bring these three groups together on an equal footing. Through that synergy we are creating expert teams whose combined influence could one day transform the conformist mould of healthcare in this country. And turn the NHS from being predominantly a disease service into a genuine health service.

Our philosophy is simple. Medicine must be rooted in its traditional values of vocation and public service, grounded in good science that takes account of the psychosocial as well as the biomedical, respect the people it deals with – and never, ever reduce patients to mere collections of organs, symptoms or disease.

Teams

'The practice of medicine no longer belongs to doctors alone.'

'The ‘healthcare team’ usually refers to the clinical team responsible for the care of an individual patient. But there is a wider team than that. There are the commissioners and managers. The experts and authors of official guidance. The scientists who develop and test diagnostic techniques and treatments. The economists and others who define productivity, efficiency and value for money.

At the centre is the patient. At least, that is where the patient should be but too often isn’t. As the NHS White Paper puts it:

'…the NHS lacks a genuinely patient-centred approach. . .  Healthcare systems are in their infancy in putting the experience of the user first.'

Clinical teams work with their patients and each other but have little contact with the experts and decision makers who create the healthcare environment.  Similarly, commissioners, scientists and economists may have little systematic contact with patients and limited understanding of the realities and sheer messiness of every day clinical practice.

That needs to change. Better communication between all those who contribute to good medicine is essential if we are to improve healthcare in the face of increasing fragmentation, vested interests and a national financial crisis.

What we are doing

With the College’s flat, non-hierarchical structure, we are creating new initiatives that challenge how healthcare is managed and delivered, help the public to look after their own health and support frontline clinicians and therapists.

The focus is on how we can improve health and well-being, instead of waiting until people are sick before we help them. We have an open mind on the best, most clinically and cost effective solutions. Where there is a good evidence base, that means we are prepared to consider complementary as well as orthodox interventions, especially in the treatment of long-term conditions for which science has yet to provide a cure.

Our Councils and Faculties allow groups of highly experienced clinicians and patients to come together, create programmes of work and advocate for change.

Our Education committee is putting together a series of courses for professional updating, and to bring new perspectives to the work of healthcare.

We also offer a wide range of events for both clinicians and patients.

We invite you to join us now, and become part of a revolution in health.