The great training robbery

Abstract

I chose to train in general practice for a multitude of powerful and positive reasons but increasingly feel the victim of a great training robbery. Many problems have beset the programme, with the recent House of Lords report calling it unfit for purpose.1 There is however nothing more illustrative of the depth of despair than the lived experiences of ambitious generalists who are used as cannon fodder for an understaffed, flailing secondary care system. General practice is the shortest specialty training for the broadest of all fields. To become a generalist today, half of my training is spent in subspecialised secondary and tertiary care settings, honing skills, accumulating knowledge, and reflecting on the experiences of service delivery in these particular institutions. The nature and purview of hospital care are fundamentally different, such as, its pathology-centred approach, …