Established in 1993, the European Federation of Psychiatric Trainees (EFPT) has aimed to represent psychiatric trainees’ views in different platforms and to advocate for better training. Representation of more than twenty thousand psychiatry and child and adolescent psychiatry (CAP) trainees has been realized through the cooperation of currently 34 national trainee associations (NTAs).

To discuss the function of NTAs with regard to empowerment of psychiatry trainees and to share the relevant experience of EFPT.

The formation process of NTAs and the outcomes of NTA network of EFPT will be explored.

The history of EFPT demonstrates that NTAs played an important role, first of all, in the formation of following NTAs. Today, most of them either independent or have a semi-independent position within the national psychiatry associations. The NTA network within EFPT has enabled the conduction of international research studies, which has contributed to the development of an insight on how specific aspects of psychiatry are perceived by trainees. The input of EFPT in several guidance documents and the dissemination of them through NTAs helped raising awareness about the rights and competencies, for both individual trainees and the organizations they formed. NTAs, with the good examples, support and encourage from the other NTAs, have become more involved in discussions about curriculum changes, even to a degree where trainees facilitated the launch of different rotations.

The experience EFPT proves that the organized efforts of NTAs can have a positive impact on psychiatry training in general, as well as the professional development of individual psychiatry trainees.

The author has not supplied his declaration of competing interest.