Mentoring for NHS general practitioners: a prospective pilot study of an action learning approach.

Background: Annual GP appraisal provides a standardised system to identify poorly performing or underperforming doctors as well as development needs. Mentoring is widely used for enhancing personal and professional development and might help address these needs. However, doubts have been expressed in the literature about the strength of the supporting evidence. The aim of this pilot study was to explore the possible benefits of using a specified 'action learning' approach to mentoring through a prospective study design.

Method: Both mentors and mentees were recruited using open invitation through the local appraisal service. Mentees were allocated to either one-to-one or group sessions. Each participant received four sessions of mentoring. All sessions were evaluated using a learning needs log, visual plots and feedback forms.

Results: Fourteen GPs participated as mentees (via either self-referral or the appraisal process). Twelve completed the four sessions of action learning mentoring. The average duration of one-to-one sessions was 1 hour 45 minutes. Each group session was 3 hours long. Time between sessions varied from 7 to 30 days. The average number of days between each session was 17. Benefits were observed in several areas of personal and professional development.

Conclusions: The mentoring intervention piloted in this study demonstrates a feasible approach to identifying and developing learning needs. Small numbers in the study make it difficult to attribute this specifically to the action learning approach taken. However, the framework presented was recognised as useful by the mentors. Future work will aim to identify if the approach is due to action learning specifically or the more general effect of counselling.