Education Co-ordinator. Nicky is invaluable to our GP registrars, medical students and trainers. Nicky also supports our research work and arranges our monthly clinical meetings.
Associate Dean North Devon GP Training Programme. PGCert Medical Education. GP Trainer.
Medical Student Lead. GP Training Programme Director, North Devon VTS. PGCert Clinical Education. GP Trainer. FSRH Faculty Registered Trainer.
GP Registrar Lead. GP Trainer.
GP Training Programme Director, Exeter and East Devon VTS. GP Trainer.
GP Trainer. PGCert Clinical Education. Exeter Medical School Professional Development Group Tutor.
GP Trainer. Lead for surgery and dermatology Integrated Training Post.
GP Trainer. PCN ARRS role lead.
GP lead for Foundation doctors
Our current Exeter Medical School Trained assessors:
We are an experienced and thriving training practice. We are committed to offering registrars the best possible training experience in a friendly and supportive team environment. Many of our registrars have chosen to stay with us after training as fully qualified GPs. Currently, 4 of our 8 partners started out as GP trainees with Amicus. Dr MacKenzie recently joined our salaried GP team in January 2023, after completing her registrar training with us.
GP registrars are fully qualified doctors with at least three years’ hospital experience. Some GP registrars have trained in other medical specialties before deciding to pursue General Practice as a career.
Registrars here are a valuable part of our team and work under the supervision of a more experienced GP until they complete their training. There are seven GP trainers at the practice, as listed above in our ‘Meet the team’ section.
We love to get our GP registrars involved in Amicus Education themselves. This can include teaching medical students, presenting at clinical meetings, working with us on exciting projects and presenting our work at national conferences.
We are delighted to be a Tier 2 visa sponsor which enables us to work with doctors who are International Medical Graduates once they have completed GP training.
Amicus Health is proud to be involved in the training of medical students from the University of Exeter. We host medical students from the early years up until their final year, where they become part of our team during their 6-week placement at Amicus.
If a medical student is present on the day of your appointment, you will always be asked beforehand if you are happy for them to be there. Whilst consultation skills are an important part of medical education, we completely understand if you prefer a student was not present during your visit.
If you are a medical student set to join us, Nicky will be in touch with your timetable well in advance of your placement. If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to reach out to Nicky prior to your placement with us.
We host foundation year two doctors, known as our F2. F2s are fully qualified doctors who are in their first two years of working in medicine. They can consult independently but work under the supervision of our experienced GPs. At present, our F2s are mainly based at our Bampton site. Around half of foundation programme doctors will go on to have careers in General Practice.
The National GP Retention Scheme is a designed to support doctors, who might otherwise leave the profession, remain in clinical general practice. This can be for a number of reasons such as being close to retirement or having childcare responsibilities.
Amicus Health has hosted several doctors as retained GP and is firmly committed to supporting our colleagues to stay in the profession. If you are interested in the retainer scheme at Amicus Health please contact our practice manager (kensa.harris4@nhs.net).
We are passionate about supporting the next generation of doctors. We are proud to have started a free course for college students considering a career in medicine.
The 'A Taste of Medicine' (ATOM) course is run over a number of evenings and is designed to provide expert advice about becoming a doctor as well as helping to boost your UCAS application.
The course includes:
The course has been featured in a Devon Live artice which you can read here.
For more information about the 'A Taste of Medicine' course please email jocelyn.chamberlain@nhs.net.
The team at Amicus are delighted to give talks to younger children about keeping healthy, visiting the doctor's or even future careers in Healthcare. If you would like to arrange a visit to your nursery, school or children's club please contact jocelyn.chamberlain@nhs.net. You can read more about our visits to local schools in a recent Devon Live article here.
Dr Greg Davies is our practice lead on research, and he is supported by our co-ordinator Nicky. We are currently actively involved in the Cancer Alliance in East Devon, as well as other exciting research projects. You can read more about research at Amicus here.
Doctors from Amicus often showcase their work on a national level at the RCGP conference. Previous projects include working with asylum seekers, projects on menopause care and asthma, primary care education and presentations on sustainable healthcare.
Clare House Surgical is a long running service within Amicus and provides skin surgery, carpal tunnel operations and vasectomies. Medical students and GP registrars are encouraged to spend time in our operating theatre to learn about surgery in the community. Dr Wood runs an Integrated Training Post in Surgery and Dermatology for GP registrars. The surgical team also teach doctors regionally as part of the New To Practice scheme.
The team at Amicus health meet every morning for an informal meeting where we share clinical updates and discuss interesting cases. This forms an important part of our commitment to lifelong learning for all members or our team from first year students to our most senior physicians. It also ensures our patients with more complex healthcare needs benefit from the knowledge and experience of a large team of physicians.
Once a month we hold in-house clinical meetings. These bring all clinicians in the practice together for an educational update and discussion of important issues like safeguarding and learning events.
We welcome our registrars and medical students to these meetings whilst you are on placement with us. We would encourage you to present any quality improvement work you do with us at these meetings too.
Dr Stephens is now a Faculty Registered Trainer, allowing us to train contraceptive coil and implant fitters of the future and help them achieve their letters of competence (LoC-IUD and Loc-SDI).