The editorial on how medical schools can encourage students to choose general practice as a career1 is extremely timely. The East Midlands has a significant primary care recruitment and retention issue. We would like to share some of our innovations at Nottingham Medical School that aim to enable students to make informed decisions about career choices including primary care, and nurture those with a particular interest if they wish to ‘choose general practice’.
We have close links with the student GP Society to facilitate regular sessions with GPs with special interests, focus groups, and encouraging visits to RCGP Euston Square and national conferences.
We have set up a Buddy Scheme with GP registrars for medical students that supports interested GP Society members through medical school to specialty applications.
There is significant GP representation on the medical school admissions panel. Multiple mini-interviews have replaced the traditional interviews and will now include primary care scenarios.
A Widening Access project promoting GP careers to local academicallyable pupils from secondary schools that don’t traditionally attain medical school admissions.
From September 2016 we are doubling the clinical contact time in primary care and encouraging all GP tutors to be role models for our students; ‘Being a GP can be whatever you want it to be.’
We are planning ‘open half-day release’ sessions with local GP schemes and Primary Care Professor Society presentations and research workshops.
‘First5®’ young GPs in the division have developed a short PowerPoint presentation on ‘Why choose GP’ to deliver to local F1 doctors and as a podcast resource.
We are collaborating with the Nottingham Medical Graduates of 2016 for a 1-year reunion dinner and organising a careers fair in the afternoon.
We hope that these innovations provide some thought and encouragement, and may be adapted to other medical schools.
- © British Journal of General Practice 2016
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