Every year we are visited by students from The UCL/ Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine in London and The Royal London Hospital each for two-four weeks. These students are within a few months of finishing their medical training and starting their first jobs as doctors. They have spent some time in a general practice in London earlier on in their training and come to us for further experience and to see a different type of practice. Dr Cripps is the UCL/Royal Free’s appointed Clinical Tutor for this and Dr Edwards for The Royal London.

postgraduate

Dr Cripps, Dr Edwards and Dr Robinson have been approved as trainers in general practice.
This means that a doctor is attached to the practice usually for six or twelve months to gain experience of general practice before they are assessed as being able to go into practice themselves.
In addition to the year they spend in general practice they will have spent a year working in hospital as a houseman (six months in medicine and six months in surgery) and a minimum of a further two years in senior house posts in hospital (usually six month periods in casualty, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, psychiatry and elderly care or general medicine).

foundation year 2 house officers

Traditionally doctors have spent the first year after qualifying doing two six month house jobs in hospital medicine and surgery. Now they do two years and in the second year do four months in general practice.

doctors from abroad

We have been visited by two doctors from Romania and two doctors from Lithuania who have been in this country on schemes organised by the European Union and the World Bank to look at British general practice and primary care teams with a view to setting up training programmes in their own countries for systems that are appropriate to them.