Category: ACP

The Centre for Advancing Practice ePortfolio (supported) Route is designed to enable experienced Advanced Practitioners to evidence the equivalence of their education and training to the requirements as described in the Multi-professional framework for advanced clinical practice in England (MPF).

These supported places are suitable for our Orthoptists who feel that they are able to closely match the ACP framework, which includes the four pillars of advanced practice.  Your portfolio will be reviewed and you will be given feedback on any areas that might need a ‘top-up’ with a view to helping you to achieve this and we expect some financial and HEI support to be given.

These supported places are shared between all professions, and it would be great to see some of our advanced Orthoptists, progress, with support, to ACP status, via this route.  The webinar detailed below will be a great place to start!

The Centre for Advancing Practice Supported ePortfolio Route is designed to enable Practitioners to evidence that they meet the advance practitioner requirements described in the Multi-professional framework for advanced clinical practice in England (MPF). Currently, individuals would normally evidence this by successfully completing a Centre accredited Advanced Practice Programme.

The Supported ePortfolio Route will provide an alternative route to do this by mapping knowledge and skills to the MPF using the Centre’s ePortfolio.

Application process:

The online application form for this route is available via the Advanced Practice website and will remain open until late January 2022.

The application stage takes less than 10 minutes to complete. Successful applicants will be allocated to an education provider and complete a Learning Needs Analysis. They will then start to complete the ePortfolio itself. It is anticipated that this will take place in the spring, when the pressure on services is more manageable.

Guidance materials

To support, HEE have developed a guidance document , a set of FAQs and held a webinar, which you can view below.

For further details please see: https://advanced-practice.hee.nhs.uk/eportfolio-route/

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If you are interested in finding out more:

ePortfolio (Supported) Route information

Guidance materials:

• FAQ
• Application Information
• Eligibility and guidance
• Centre for Advancing Practice’s list of accredited programmes

The HEE publication Supervision for Advanced Clinical Practice provides practical and comprehensive guidance for workplace supervision of trainee Advanced Practitioners. It draws on an array of resources and advice, setting out clear pathways for both the trainee and supervisor.

Multi-professional advanced clinical practitioners are a growing part of the modern healthcare workforce. Their contribution to patient care and pathways is recognised in health and care policy (NHS, 2020). They are registered practitioners from a range of professional backgrounds that have advanced level capabilities across the four pillars of clinical, leadership and management, education and research, as set out in the ‘The Multi-professional Framework for Advanced Clinical Practice in England’, (NHS, 2017).

To develop these capabilities, advanced practitioners undertake a combination of practice-based (workplace) learning and training with academic learning at level 7, (masters).

The supervision of healthcare practitioners through their training and beyond is an established part of healthcare practice, endorsed by professional bodies and regulators as the cornerstone of both professional and public safety. Currently, supervision has a profession-specific focus and vary greatly within and across professions.

“This guidance pulls together the insights and experiences of colleagues from across the health professions who recognise the value of multi-professional advanced clinical practitioners and the role of skilful, high quality supervision in ensuring professional and public safety.” 

Deborah Harding, St George’s, University of London

Existing workplace supervision practices may not map neatly to the learning needs of developing multi-professional advanced clinical practitioners/trainees. Nor can it be assumed that uni-professional colleagues have an understanding of the professional scope or typical clinical practice profile of developing advanced clinical practitioner/ trainees from different qualifying professions.

This publication aims to

• establish the requirements of multi-professional advanced practitioner supervision
• establish the training and development of supervisors
• improve consistency and limit supervision practice variation across the health and care sector with a focus on professional and public safety in advanced clinical practice.

This publication has been developed collaboratively with a wide range of stakeholders from across the field of advanced clinical practice; from primary care to mental health and children’s services to emergency medicine. With advanced clinical practice continuing to develop in rapid and diverse ways, it is anticipated that this is a first iteration of such guidance.

“The document provides practical and comprehensive guidance for workplace supervision of individuals undertaking the training journey to becoming an Advanced Practitioner. As such, it draws on a comprehensive array of resources and advice, setting out a clear set of pathways for both the trainee and supervisor. 

The document addresses the issues of multi-profession supervision within the changing and varied environments within which the trainee will be learning. Various definitions and roles are identified; Co-ordinating Education Supervisor and Associate Workplace Supervisors, with clear descriptions of these individual roles. The employers role is also identified with a solution-centric approach to some of the challenges that may occur in relation to providing and supporting workplace supervision. 

The guidance is well laid out which supports it’s use as an ‘often to be returned to’ source of information. There is a useful glossary, abbreviation and appendixes, references and further reading. 

Health Education England supports the guidance and encourages trainees and supervisors to add a copy to your training  portfolio and to refer to it frequently.”

Dr Richard Collier, HEE Lead for Advanced Practice & Lead for Centre for Advancing Practice, Health Education England

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If you are interested in finding out more:

Access the full publication here.