International Opportunities

What is the Visiting Observer Fellowship Scheme?

This is a new scheme which offers short clinical observership placements within the UK National Health Service (NHS) to Emergency Medicine doctors from low-resource settings.

Placements will last for four weeks around September/October 2024. During this time, successful Visiting Fellows are invited to visit the RCEM UK head office and attend the RCEM Annual Scientific Conference (8-10 October).

During the attachment, the doctor is not given any responsibility and is not able to make clinical decisions or give clinical advice. The doctor will not receive or be required to obtain registration or a license to practice with the UK General Medical Council.

Judging criteria

We wish to make awards to the most suitable applicants who will be able to use their award to their own maximum benefit and, to an extent, to the benefit of the College’s international work. If no suitable applicant can be identified, then the award may not be made in any given year.

The judging panel will take into consideration the following criteria:

• Generally, applicants not otherwise likely to be able to visit the UK
• Quality of proposal with concise summary of their interests and needs
• Plan for use of the Fellowship on their return home

The judging panel will be mindful of the requirement for:

• No concurrent awards or scholarships
• Letters of support from the candidate’s head of department – essential

Please send your application to globalem@rcem.ac.uk  by 17:00 on Wednesday 31 July 2024.

Download the Observer Fellowship guidance and application form.

Welcome to our Global Placement Grant Scheme for UK-based RCEM members and fellows!

Our Global Health placement grants offer RCEM members and fellows based in the UK, the opportunity to spend time in low-income settings, working to improve healthcare systems and or support programmes developing Emergency Medicine. By sharing their skills, knowledge, and expertise to help build capacity, develop sustainable solutions, and empower local healthcare providers to deliver high-quality care.

Whether you’re a trainee or have completed your training, we welcome applications from all backgrounds and levels of experience. We ask applicants to evidence that their selected placements are tailored to their skills and interests, and that the selected partner organizations evidences a project with a focus on sustainable impact. Where possible evidence of how this placement may offer a future opportunity for RCEM to support the development of EM in that particular setting.

Grants of £1,250 are normally awarded although in some extreme cases amounts above this may be considered if the rationale behind this is evidenced.  The Global Emergency Committee will review all applications and if successful confirm approval of the funds to support an international placement.

Longer term placements will be favoured due to the ability the building meaningful relationships in-country and in the interest of environmental sustainability.

If you would like to apply, please download the application form below and return it to globalem@rcem.ac.uk by 17:00 on Wednesday 31 July 2024.
Global Placement Grant Scheme application form

Please see below the reflections of the 2022 successful Global Placement grant winner who has recently returned from a volunteer programme with AFEM in South Africa.

Emma Gold’s placement was with the African Federation of Emergency Medicine (AFEM). AFEM is the BEC training credentialing body for IFEM for the African region. This is the most active WHO region in rolling out the BEC training. My role involved assisting in the logistical and technical support to countries that want to conduct BEC courses. I worked with the country focal point to support them through the credentialing process and facilitator progression. I manage the AFEM BEC training tracking database and have been strengthening the existing records of completed training.

Events and opportunities of Global EM and Health interest

If you would like to apply for endorsement of EM development activities in LMIC, please review the process and criteria document found here.

Please complete the application form found here and send via email to globalem@rcem.ac.uk

Educational Standards Framework for Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) approved Fellowships in Humanitarian Medicine and Global Health

The GEM Committee are working towards making Fellowships in Humanitarian Medicine and Global Health more accessible to UK doctors and have created a framework for educational standards, this document can be found here .

Helpful papers around international fellowships can be found below:

• Core Curricular Elements for Fellowship Training in International Emergency Medicine
• Experience with the core curricular elements for international emergency medicine fellowships

If you would like to share opportunities that are in line with these standards, please email globalem@rcem.ac.uk