Blog: Medical Council Recent Speaking Engagements

In line with the Medical Council Statement of Strategy 2025 – 2028 – one of our key strategic objectives is to listen and proactively engage with doctors, the public and our stakeholders in order to ensure a greater understanding of the Role of the Medical Council and to foster collaboration and to develop stronger partnerships.

We aim to achieve this strategic objective by :

• Engaging meaningfully with our stakeholders including other regulatory agencies to gain and share insights and further strengthen our relationships
• Using our regulatory voice to raise patient safety risks identified through our processes
• Continuing to forge relationships and strategic partnerships with national and international organisations to drive innovation and best practice in medical regulation

Representatives from the Medical Council regularly participate in events and conferences, providing ample opportunity to engage with the profession and public on our processes, procedures and opportunities for change. Such engagements allow for Council and Executive Leadership visibility outside of the Medical Council.

The President, Vice-President, CEO and members of the Executive Leadership Team and Heads of Function have participated in many speaking engagements over the course of 2025 and we are keen to continue this effort into 2026 and beyond.

The themes of presentations delivered are broad and varied and cover topics such as the Role of the Medical Council, our processes and outcomes, the obligations on the Medical Profession from a regulatory perspective, Overview of Professionalism, The Ethical Guide, Compassionate Regulation, the changes to the complaints process and Workforce Intelligence analysis to name but a few.

We utilise our speaking engagements as an opportunity to promote our regulatory guidance for doctors and stakeholders on new policies, initiatives, legislation and technologies in healthcare.

We welcome feedback from our stakeholders arising from our speaking engagements and feedback to date has been positive.

We are always happy to be invited to promote our activities and welcome the opportunity to present to Grand Rounds, Postgraduate Training Bodies, Hospital Groups, Employers,  Representative Bodies, Medical Schools, Patient Safety and Advocacy Groups, Regulatory Fora and any other stakeholders that would be keen to hear from the Medical Council.

During the months of January and February of 2026 we have continued to promote the work of the Medical Council at many events that have taken place. The speaking engagements spanned hybrid, online and in-person activities. We've included an overview and some photos of a few of our most recent highlights.

Invitations to speak were received from Postgraduate Training Bodies, Hospital Groups, Universities and Representative Bodies including the Irish College of GPs, the RCPI, Blackrock Hospital Group, University College Dublin, the RCSI, the College of Anaesthesiologists of Ireland and the Irish Cancer Trails Network.

Our President Dr Suzanne Crowe drew from her experience in paediatric intensive care and as President of the Medical Council to explore the importance of kindness in moments of high stress and clinical intensity when she spoke at an RCPI Masterclass Workshop in January. Her presentation was titled "Kindness Under Pressure".

The Irish Cancer Trails Network invited Dr Suzanne Crowe to present on "Life Lessons : Advice to my trainee self".

We also had the opportunity to present at Grand Rounds in Blackrock Clinic on “The Medical Council’s role within the healthcare system” where we presented an overview of the role of the Council, while also covering the evolving management of complaints against the backdrop of the evolving regulatory context.

We were grateful for the invitation to also speak at the inaugural emerging leaders conference at the College of Anaesthesiologists of Ireland where our President spoke on what leadership meant to her as a doctor, and President of the Medical Council.

The Medical Council welcomes the opportunity to speak to student doctors within our Medical Schools and we were honoured to be afforded the chance to speak on the topic of Professionalism to Year 1 RCSI students, and Year 1 and 2 trainees within the Irish College of GPs.

We will continue to work with our stakeholder organisations to seek out opportunities to engage with and to speak on matters of importance over the coming months that will seek to positively impact patient safety while helping to build trust, gather valuable insights, and foster collaboration.

If you are organising an event or conference and would like a speaker from the Medical Council to participate, please contact us by e-mailing communications@mcirl.ie .