The role of London Deanery

London Deanery is responsible for postgraduate medical and dental training in London. Our overarching aim is to improve the quality of patient care by ensuring the supply of doctors and dentists who are educated, trained and motivated to play their part in a first class modern health service. We aim to do this in a way that is responsive to the government's national objectives for health and social care, the local context in which these doctors and dentists work, and the changing needs and expectations of the patients they serve.

Our purpose is to:

• To commission postgraduate medical and dental education, to standards set by the General Medical and Dental Councils and the approved College curricula for all branches of Medicine and Dentistry
• To manage postgraduate medical and dental education, and assure its quality
• To implement national policies on postgraduate medical and dental education including workforce planning and development
• To contribute to multi-professional workforce planning and development through the relevant structures determined by the Department of Health*
• To maintain a database of doctors and dentists in training in London*
• To ensure equality of opportunity in recruitment and progress through training programmes*
• To ensure that the performance and progress of all doctors and dentists in training is regularly, reliably and fairly assessed and recorded*
• To provide appropriate careers information, advice, counselling and/or assistance for doctors and dentists and facilitate training for those with special needs*
• To make a contribution to the strategic thinking of NHS London using both our educational perspective and the intelligence we get from our networks.*

_{* Currently subject to review as new structures are created and develop through 2012-13.}

Principles at the heart of quality management

There are a number of principles which inform our work. These include: 

• Putting patients needs from the medical and dental professions at the heart of everything we do
• Improving the education and development of doctors and dentists to continuously improve healthcare
• Building effective and enduring relationships with all stakeholders based on mutual respect
• Transparency in everything we do
• Reliability as the lead London body in the delivery of world class postgraduate medical and dental education
• Using evidence to inform our work. Where evidence does not yet exist then we will work to develop the evidence base
• Achieving best value for money in the expenditure of our budget of £292m (2010/11).