Portsmouth and Isle of Wight ST1s and ST2s (and sometimes military GP trainees, who are always welcome) meet on the third Wednesday of each month for protected GP orientated education.  These sessions are organised by our ST1/2 Programme Directors, Ms Sue Crane, Dr Richard Williams (from IoW) and Dr Simon Tricker.  They cover a wide variety of clinical, communication, management and career development topics.

We meet in our new 'Primary Care Education Centre' at St James's Hospital (click here for a map), which has very up to date presentation gadgetry, plenty of space, breakout rooms and a large, comfortable teaching room.  We also use the time to offer specific support to individual trainees, for career guidance/mentorship and to hear feedback about specific rotation posts.  We often eat lunch in the hospital restaurant (which is very good!) and the Programme Directors very much value this unstructured time with trainees to hear how they're getting on.

The Education Programme runs 10 months a year (not run in August or December) and includes an annual conference for all GP ST1/2 in Wessex and three sessions a year combined with the ST3 Day Release Course, which gives our trainees an opportunity to network and share experiences with other trainees in Portsmouth and Wessex.  One of the combined ST1/2/3 days is our 'Buckets & Spades' day on the Isle of Wight!

For the ST1/2 doing their GP placement we've recently started a 'Learning Set', which is a facilitated learning group and has been extremely popular.  Some trainees find this part of their training quite professionally isolating as the weekly Day Release Course doesn't start until ST3 - this group gives them the opportunity to share experiences, learn from each other, and network.

We are also setting up regular rheumatology experience for ST1/2 doing their GP placement, which is due to start in February 2011.

We ask for feedback after each education session but if any of our trainees have any specific requests for inclusion within the programme we'd love to hear from them.

Click here to download our current programme.

Updated 19th August 2011