Dynamic CPD certification!

One of the lesser known requirements of the enhanced CPD scheme is that the time awarded must be accurate. Spending a couple of minutes answering a few questions and being awarded an hour of CPD is a no-no. The only rounding up (or down) occurs at the end of the CPD year.

You might have noticed that our courses have a guide value for CPD attributed to them rather than a fixed one. This is the time that we expect it to take to complete a course once. It is a relatively simple calculation for a live ("synchronous") CPD activity because the duration is fixed.However, on-demand ("asynchronous") courses may not be so straightforward especially when they are non-linear e.g. have branches or optional content.

Our on-demand presentations can be paused, repeated or skipped through. Many have quizzes and some interactive scenarios and optional content. This means that the time spent completing a course will vary from person to person depending upon the path taken through the learning content and when this occurs.

What happens after completing a course and you want to revisit it? Perhaps a patient presents with a specific request and you recall that this was discussed in a course. When we first launched our online CPD service many years ago, you would have to reset the course and complete it again. This was neither convenient nor intuitive.

Now you simply open the presentation, go to the relevant section and view it. The time you spend is recorded and added to your CPD record.

​Under enhanced CPD registrants must submit a CPD report each year, not just at the end of the five-year cycle. Our previous certificate displayed only the guide time and the total time spent. The new one breaks down the total time into the current CPD year, the five-year cycle and that spent to first complete the course. This makes it much easier to understand your activities and complete your annual report.

Example

Let's assume that you are a dentist whose five-year cycle started on 1 January 2016. You participated in a live webinar on oral cancer on 1 November 2017. The course had a guide time of two hours but lasted 105 minutes. You completed the reflection after the event which took five minutes. You therefore took a total time of 110 minutes (1 hour 50 minutes).

On 31 March 2018 you completed the on-demand version of the presentation, spending a further 90 minutes. You updated the reflection, taking another five minutes. That adds an additional 95 minutes, taking the total to 205 minutes.

When you viewed your certificate you would have seen:

• The course was first completed on 1 November 2017 with a time spent of 1 hour 50 minutes.You have spent 1 hour 35 minutes this CPD year
  
• Your total time spent on the course is 3 hours 25 minutes (205 minutes).
• The five-year cycle total is the same as the total time spent because the course activity has all occurred within the current five-year cycle.

Another requirement of enhanced CPD is that your log of completed CPD activities includes the development outcome(s) achieved (A-D). CPD providers must provide the anticipated development outcomes on their course information, but these may not be the same as those delivered.

As part of our reflections we ask the participant to confirm which GDC development outcomes were delivered. Both the anticipated and delivered outcomes are now displayed.

For the information to be accurate, you will need to set your CPD five-year cycle start date in your profile. If you have not done so, you will be prompted to do so when you display the certificate. There is even a link to make it simple. If you do not know your start date, log into the eGDC portal where you will find it.

We strongly recommend downloading your certificate during each CPD year so that you have records for each year of the cycle. You should update your CPD activity log accordingly. If you use our free PDP & CPD Activity template your totals for all your activities are calculated, making submission at the end of the year a breeze.

Please note that for the annual totals to be accurate for on-demand presentations, you should start and complete them within the same CPD year. If you do not only the total time will be accurate.