DIMAH

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DIMAH Meeting Minutes: General Medical Council London, 23rd March 2018

Held on the 23rd March at the General Medical Council, Regent’s Place, 350 Euston Road, London, NW1 3JN.
Present: Margot Turner, Riya George, Shuangyu Li, Adrian Barrowdale, Jia Liu, Rachel Lindley, Pete Leftwick, Margot Turner, Ioanna Maraki, Jon Ward and Enam-ul-Haque (via Skype).

 

1. Apologies: Rebecca Farringdon, Aarti Bansal, Davinder Singh, Helen Orton, Annie Cushing, Wendy Lowe, Manbinder Sidhu, Nisha Dogra, Valerie Farnsworth and Mairead Corrigan.

2. Minutes from the last meeting Agreed as a true record.

3. Matters arising and action points from the last meeting:

a.) The following action points from the previous meeting on the 16.01.2018 remain:

  • Candan Ertubey agreed to circulate a document to all DIMAH members to clearly establish what other organisations they represent in order to begin strategically planning how to enhance DIMAH’s relationship with other groups. On this document, it was also recommended to establish the interests of DIMAH members, namely teaching, research or policy.
  • Aarti Bansal, Margot Turner, Shuangyu Li, Candan Ertubey and Helen Orton agreed to develop a formal strategy for liaising and attracting new members towards DIMAH and to formulate a proposed training package to offer institutions.
  • Margot Turner to formulate a proposed plan for different streams of funding that would support DIMAH and to circulate information about different past workshops done by DIMAH members to the group.

b.) Reviewing DIMAH constitution and committee roles:

Pete Leftwick circulated a revised version of the DIMAH constitution and committee roles prior to the meeting for DIMAH members to comment and review. The revised document was discussed at the meeting and the following action points were AGREED:

  • Separate the DIMAH agenda into a business and professional development section. This would help clarify the different aspects of the DIMAH meeting to members, especially new members attending.
  • Formally explore different options for members to access DIMAH meetings remotely i.e. via Skype, broadcasting, para-scoping or via the DIMAH website.
  • To expand the role and description of the Deputy Chair, emphasising the importance of collaboration, cooperation, moderation and to support/ challenge the Chair.
  • Committee members are expected to attend at least three out of four DIMAH meetings a year, members present AGREED it is important for committee members to show a degree of commitment to DIMAH.
  • Clearer description on the role of the student representative and how to encourage student engagement in DIMAH.

The following action points were AGREED:

  • Riya George AGREED to circulate a revised template of the agenda (splitting the agenda into a business and professional development section) to core DIMAH members to comment on.
  • Enam-ul-Haque AGREED to explore different options to access DIMAH meetings remotely.
  • Pete Leftwick AGREED to revise the DIMAH constitution document and the committee roles in light of the discussions at the meetings.
  • Jon Ward AGREED to revise the student engagement document, in particular clarifying the role of the student representative.
  • Ioanna Maraki AGREED to circulate to DIMAH members’ information on the GMC Student Voices Group.

 

c.) Feedback from the GMC Diversity and Equality Meeting: 22.02.2018

Margot Turner and Adrian Barrowdale informed members of the following key updates from this
meeting:

a.) GMC has commissioned a piece of research focusing on the Black and Minority Ethnic (BAME) attainment gap in UK medical schools, both at an undergraduate and postgraduate level. This will be presented at the Academy of Medical Educators ‘Fairness and Equity in Medical Education’ conference on the 25.04.2018. The GMC is actively seeking information from medical schools on any pieces of research or initiatives which explore the BAME attainment gap or race/ethnicity.

b.) Margot Turner mentioned that Jane Canon and Steve Gannon from the GMC are particularly interested in working with DIMAH on this issue.

 

The following action points were AGREED:

  • All DIMAH members are kindly requested to inform Margot Turner of any pieces of research or initiatives which explore the BAME attainment gap in their medical school. Please email Margot Turner at [email protected]. It was AGREED this information would be shared at the next meeting in the section under continuing professional development.
  • Rachel Lindley AGREED to liaise with Enam-ul-Haque regarding his work on widening participation.

 

4. Membership and Finance:

Pete Leftwick provided the following key updates regarding membership and finance:

DIMAH is in a secure place to pay the next instalment for the DIMAH website in July (£500) which should last till January 2019.

Existing institutions and individual members have renewed DIMAH membership.

A strategy needs to be develop for attracting medical schools that have not yet joined

DIMAH. Pete enquired around whether DIMAH should be emailing those particular medical schools directly, liaising with the Diversity leads at those medical schools or developing specialised training packages on diversity to deliver.

 

The following actions were AGREED:

Rachel Lindley AGREED to add DIMAH membership to the agenda on her Community
Leads Meetings.
Margot Turner AGREED to create a flyer about DIMAH and how to join for Rachel to
distribute at her meeting and to use at conferences/events to attract new members.

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Shuangyu Li and Jon Ward AGREED to raise DIMAH membership at the GP tutor
training days at their institutions.
5. Research Updates:
 Ioanna Maraki and Adrian Barrowdale informed members that they published a piece of
research on the GMC new guidance on health and disability on the AMEE MedEd Publisher’s
special issue on diversity.
6.
Conference Updates:
The next DIMAH conference will be held on the 08.11.2018 at the University of Liverpool. The
following key points were discussed in relation to the planning of this conference:

Margot Turner, Shuangyu Li, Pete Leftwick and Riya George AGREED to be part of the
conference planning committee.
A maximum of 100 individuals can attend the conference, the main conference room and five
break-out rooms have been booked for the whole day.
The theme of the conference was AGREED as ‘Collaboration for Change in Diversity
Education and Healthcare’, with a particular focus on student engagement.
5 workshops for the morning and afternoon need to be established, Adrian Barrowdale and



Ioanna Maraki from the GMC AGREED to host one workshop exploring regulatory barriers
to diversity education. Other ideas for workshops included student engagement in developing
diversity education – ‘developed for students by students’, widening participation, discussing
‘contentious issues’, the use of language and images in diversity and patient involvement in
diversity education.

AGREED it would be valuable to include poster presentations at the conference. Rachel
Lindley offered to provide iPads from the University of Manchester to allow for e-posters.
Speaker suggestions for the conference included Professor Rick Iedema, Director of Inter

professional Education at King’s College London, Ioanna Maraki suggested inviting
experienced speakers from the London Debating Society to introduce the topic of
‘contentious issues’ and Margot Turner suggested using a drama/theatre company (used at a
previous DIMAH conference with Connie Wilson and John Spencer). It was AGREED the
opening of the conference should be led by the Pro-Vice Chancellor at the University of
Liverpool and the afternoon opening should be led by Margot Turner.
The following action points were AGREED:

Margot Turner, Shuangyu Li, Pete Leftwick and Riya George AGREED to arrange a
meeting in London (Pete Leftwick via Skype) to discuss planning of the conference.
Pete Leftwick AGREED to formulate an initial draft of the DIMAH conference
timetable and circulate this to Margot Turner, Shuangyu Li and Riya George.
Pete Leftwick AGREED to enquire around how many poster boards would be available
for the conference and whether it is feasible to include e-posters.
Ioanna Maraki & Adrian Barrowdale AGREED to explore potential key note speakers



with GMC colleague and an external debating organisation. The outcome of their
discussions will be shared at the next DIMAH meeting.
7. DIMAH website
The following action points were AGREED in regards to the DIMAH website:
 Margot Turner AGREED to upload on the DIMAH home page more images of artwork
projects she has done with students on diversity education at St George’s Medical
School.
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 It was AGREED the ‘get involved’ section needs to be changed to ‘join DIMAH’, and
the election of new chair needs to be removed from the website. It was also AGREED
the DIMAH website needs to be updated every year with a new colour or background.
Riya George AGREED to discuss this with John.

Shuangyu Li and Margot Turner have revised the welcome page and gather feedback
from DIMAH members on their proposed changes. Once revised it was AGREED
Shuangyu Li and Margot Turner will send this to John.
It was AGREED the section under ‘about DIMAH/ history of DIMAH’ should include
information about Professor Nisha Dogra as Inaugural Chair of DIMAH.
Jia Li AGREED to share her presentation slides shown during the continual


professional development section on the DIMAH website.
8. Social media and twitter:
Enam-ul-Haque AGREED to continue in the role of social media lead and further suggestions for his
role were discussed. Enam-ul-Haque AGREED to the following action points:

Develop a twitter campaign around the BAME attainment gap, Margot Turner
AGREED to help with this. The GMC media team is happy to help in promoting this
twitter campaign.
Collate all twitter chat content and upload onto the DIMAH website as a reference

source. Rachel Lindley recommended using ‘Wakelet’ (https://wakelet.com). It was
AGREED Enam would explore other options and platforms for discussion chats before
the next meeting.

It was AGREED Enam-ul-Haque would be responsible for maintaining and updating
the DIMAH website.
9. Any other business:
-DIMAH would like to thank Adrian Barrowdale and Ioanna Maraki for hosting the DIMAH meeting
at the General Medical Council.
-DIMAH would like to thank Professor Nisha Dogra for her valuable contribution to DIMAH over the
last few years.
-Proposed dates for future DIMAH meetings will be circulated to all DIMAH members via a Doodle
poll on the 26.03.2018. It was AGREED at the meeting future DIMAH meetings will be organised in
the following ways below:

End of May 2018: Either at the University of Manchester or Manchester General Medical
Council Office.
End of July 2018: Either at King’s College London, St George’s Medical School, Bart’s and
The London School of Medicine and Dentistry or the London General Medical Council
Office.
End of September/ early October 2018: University of Liverpool.


-Riya George kindly reminded members to please notify her of their attendance at DIMAH meetings
in advance for catering purposes.
-Jon Ward would like to inform members that the COMET (Communications, Medicine and Ethics)
conference is being held on the 25th – 27th June 2018 at the University of Birmingham.
-The Academy of Medical Educators is hosting a conference titled ‘Fairness and Equity in Medical
Education’ on the 25.04.2018 at the Sheffield Hallam University. A DIMAH stand will be present at
this conference.