The University of Malta’s Faculty of Medicine and Surgery has been approved as an international centre for the Royal College of Physicians’ Practical Assessment of Clinical Examination Skills (Paces) exam following a ‘mock’ pathfinder held in October 2015.

Earlier this month, 44 doctors, including six Maltese, sat for the first formal session of this clinical exam at the Faculty of Health Sciences at Mater Dei Hospital.

The Paces exam for Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (MRCP) is an internationally renowned exam that assesses doctors with at least two years’ experience at the end of their core medical training and before they embark on specialisation in a specific area of internal medicine. The exam is very prestigious, and was only held in the UK until a few years ago.

Prof. Stephen Montefort, head of the Department of Medicine and deputy dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Surgery, had proposed that Malta should seek to host such a centre. This was agreed upon after negotiations between the faculty dean Prof. Godfrey LaFerla and senior members of the faculty with the federation of the three Royal Colleges of Physicians of the UK.

Apart from the prestige of hosting this exam for international doctors, Malta has managed to get 10 ‘ring-fenced’ places for local doctors sitting for this exam in Malta without having to go to the UK to do so.

Through this arangement a number of Maltese lecturers and consultants were specifically trained so as to be able to form part of the examiners of the faculty, thus being able to assess candidates together with the visiting UK examiners.

The Royal College of Physicians has showed its approval of the first session of the exam held in Malta. The next Paces exam is due to be held in December and it is envisaged that it will be held locally twice a year.