Statement on the Anaesthetic National Recruitment Office
13 February 2024
Unfortunately, the processes of the Anaesthetic National Recruitment Office (ANRO) have now become synonymous with delay, mistake, and failure.
Over recent years, there have been few recruitment rounds which have gone without significant error, which has negatively impacted the lives of doctors wishing to enter or continue in anaesthetic training.
A Freedom of Information (FOI) request revealed the true extent of these inadequacies when the Significant Incident Report of 2021 was made public.
We released a statement after a further FOI to investigate evidence of any improvements ANRO committed to make as a result of this.
This year’s delay in the release of MSRA scoring for Core Training applicants is yet another example of a core deficit of reliability within this recruitment office. This cannot be minimised to some procedural or administrative error, but instead has to be recognised as having a significant impact on the lives of the doctors who endure this process.
It is well known that this office is understaffed and under-resourced. This seems representative of the chronic underfunding of the health system in general.
This underfunding, and the lack of meaningful moves to improve this, are in no doubt a political choice. The office itself asks for very strict application deadlines involving a significant amount of work for its applicants who are already stretched by clinical and academic commitments.
The last-minute extension of its own deadlines, which it cannot meet, are not reciprocated with the same degree of accountability that an applicant would bear should they fail to meet these deadlines.
While many conversations have taken place around how we improve this process, it is clear that regular apologies and mitigating statements from leaders in our specialty serve only to fill a vacuum where we should instead be standing up for our future colleagues.
These failures give a truly terrible impression of the organisation and humanity of the training programme before a doctor has even set foot through the door.
For this reason, we recognise the resolution which passed at the recent Royal College of Anaesthetists EGM (17th October 2023) regarding ANRO.
We would, however, like to extend this further and energise all processes in which the leadership of our specialty can look into all other ways in which another recruitment process can be created. It may seem at the moment as if there is no viable alternative.
However, to continue on in the rhythm of recent years’ failures is no way to treat the future of our specialty. We have no confidence that ANRO can be trusted to carry out a just, timely, and humane recruitment process in its current format.
We are encouraged by Dr Fiona Donald’s open letter to Amanda Pritchard and will continue to advocate for change through all the avenues of trainee representation which we currently hold.
Dr Stuart Edwardson
Chair, Trainee Committee