ABSTRACT

This chapter proposes the most effective way of raising the profile of supervision and support in primary care may be to see it as an aspect of many different activities that already happen in primary care. Virtually everyone working in primary care now attends some form of education, whether in the form of attendance at postgraduate lectures, short courses or practice presentations by colleagues or drug representatives. The chapter shows how peer supervision has the capacity to improve technical performance by harnessing new knowledge, skills or attitudes to working performance. John Launer suggests that clinical supervision can take account of many other necessary aspects of the trainer's task, including assessment and pastoral care as well as education. For most clinicians in primary care, there is a large and constantly expanding base of knowledge to be mastered, and performance to be maintained.