The teacher and the cop: the role of ‘private space' in increasingly transparent clinical practice

Education and enforcement have been two contrasting ways of managing clinical performance. Both are needed but recently health policy has placed greater emphasis on the latter, possibly to the detriment of the former. This paper examines the ways in which education and other formative aspects of clinical practice can be conducted. The boundary between education and enforcement involves a distinction between public and private space. Private space is the territory within which clinicians can review their performance and improve it from an educational perspective. The boundary between public and private space is fluid, particularly since the advent of systems to ensure clinicians' competence. The sensitive management of this boundary will determine whether the benefits of transparent clinical practice will be realized in terms of improved patient care.