Professional practice does not lend itself to easy definition and our strategy in this area is multifaceted. It comprises:

• Liaison with the Department of Health to influence and inform the healthcare reform programmes across the UK, the NHS productivity challenge, and the quality agenda. We seek to effect this through constructive engagement with:
• Health Ministers – both in our own right and through our membership of Arthritis and Musculo-skeletal Alliance – ARMA (http://www.arma.uk.net/)
• Senior Department of health officials, including the Medical director for NHS England and the relevant National Clinical Directors
• The Right Care, Centre for Workforce Intelligence, Payment by Results, Patient Reported Outcome Measures and Enhanced Recovery Programmes, as well as Procurement
• Engagement with the chief medical officers for the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
• NHS liaison through:
• Orthopaedic clinical directors at the front line via the British Orthopaedics Directors Society.
• Our Regional Advisers, who twin hatted as Royal College of Surgeons of England Regional Specialty professional Advisers.
• Our linkmen in each hospital across the UK
• ARMA to engage with commissioners in conjunction with clinical colleagues in the British Society of Rheumatologists and the Chartered Society of Physiotherapists
• Private practice – where we work closely with the British Medical Association and the Federation of Independent Practitioner Organisations
• Engagement with NHS Trusts – in particular the Specialist Orthopaedic Alliance
• International engagement – through our membership of the European Federation of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, the Carousel (the National Orthopaedic Associations of the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa), the Bone and Joint Decades, and increasing interaction with the Indian and Chinese Orthopaedic Associations
• The dissemination of good trauma and orthopaedic practice through our Blue Book and trauma guides
• The dissemination of information for orthopaedic patients
• Issues of clinical surgical practice, where we engage with:
• The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) on Quality Standards and clinical guidance
• The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) on implants and other devices, as well as the NHS Supply Chain Orthopaedic Device Evaluation Panel (ODEP)
• The Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP) for issues related to the National Joint Registry and the National Hip Fracture Database
• The National Confidential Enquiry into Patient Outcomes and Death (NCEPOD)
• Medico Legal issues in a rapidly evolving area of surgical advisory practice
  
• Extensive liaison with industry through engagement via the Association of the British Healthcare Industry (ABHI) orthopaedics Special Interest Section and our own British Orthopaedic Industry Liaison committee (BOIL)

We progress detailed elements of our practice strategy here through our Professional Practice Committee, Trauma Group and Medico Legal Committee: 

 

Developing and sustaining excellence in professional practice is a core objective of the BOA’s overall strategy. The PPC is charged by the BOA Council with maintaining a clear focus on all aspects of professional practice, including essential linkages with Association’s other core objectives related to training, education and research.

The PPC supports both surgeon and patient needs. To do this it covers: 

Professional Standards of Patient Care – objectives:

• Highlights gaps in coverage that need to be filled
• Clearly shows when guidance needs to be reviewed/updated  

- Develop a framework of standards with other members of the broader musculo-skeletal clinical and allied health professional multi-disciplinary team 

• Review existing GMC, BMA, AAOS and ABHI guidance covering:  
• Good medical practice - www.gmc-uk.org/guidance/good_medical_practice.asp
• Good surgical practice
• Good private medical practice - http://www.bma.org.uk/employmentandcontracts/independent_medical_practice/index.jsp
• Good research practice - http://www.gmc-uk.org/static/documents/content/Research_guidance_FINAL.pdf
• Good medico-legal practice

- Develop the BOA’s shopping list for the BMA and FIPO

The BOA Guidance Development Process

The Professional Practice Committee is currently implementing a new process by which future BOA Publications can receive NHS accreditation. As such, the BOA's Guidance Development Process has recently been drawn up and will soon be tested on some new and existing documents. This Guidance closely follows the NHS Evidence model with it's 6 domains and 25 criteria, and can be viewed via the mindmap (see right).

For more information about the PPC, please go to the PPC page

 

• Developing the BOA professional guidance on Major Trauma Centres

• Producing BOA Standards for Trauma (BOAST) guidelines

• Contributing to the trauma component of the emergent BOA research strategy

• Developing policies and standards of care for fragility fractures

• Co-ordination of unit reviews triggered by National Hip Fracture Database reports

For more information about the Trauma Group, please go to the Trauma Group page 

  

 The aim of the Committee is to focus on the BOA role in providing medicolegal assistance in all aspects of trauma and orthopaedic practice. Its role is to maintain an oversight of legal matters in relation to the safe practice of orthopaedic and trauma surgery and the preparation of reports for the Courts.

The medicolegal committee also has a responsibility to inform members of the Association of the changes in law relating to the practice of trauma and orthopaedic surgery, report writing and giving evidence.