Become a GP Placement Provider

Help train the doctors of tomorrow

Here at Leeds, our medical students spend approximately 20% of their studies in primary care, with NHS placements across all five years of the MBChB curriculum. Join our growing team of GP placement providers, helping to support and develop the next generation of doctors!

What are the benefits of offering student placements?

There are many! Do you want to want to inspire the next generation of doctors, promote general practice as a profession, or develop a portfolio part of your career in education? Perhaps you want to develop a positive learning culture at your surgery, improve work satisfaction, and provide an additional income stream for your practice? You also get the benefit of comprehensive support from a dedicated placements team (including experienced GP educators), and an exciting and stimulating CPD programme to enhance your learning and development. For these reasons and many more, we believe that hosting students is both fulfilling and rewarding.

We are recruiting

Our primary care undergraduate teaching is fully integrated within the MBChB curriculum and directly mapped onto the aims of the GMC document ‘Outcomes for Graduates’. This ensures primary care is strongly represented at Leeds and a career in general practice is shown as a positive option.

We currently have 125 GP surgeries from across West and North Yorkshire taking medical students on placement. It is vital that our students have the opportunity to experience a range of primary care placements and we strive to place our students in a variety of practices, from those in the inner cities to those practices providing care in more suburban and rural settings. We’re always keen to recruit new practices. Click here to register your interest in becoming a teaching practice.

University of Leeds Campus

Why get involved?

Teach to enhance and complement your clinical role

In the challenging environment of primary care, teaching provides a positive change to the working week which can be refreshing and inspiring. Being a GP tutor is also a great opportunity to further develop teaching and communication skills, many of which are transferable and relevant in the practice of day-to-day medicine. It is a rewarding and fulfilling role that many of our tutors find both complements and enhances their day-to-day clinical duties.

Benefits for the wider practice team

Hosting medical students brings a wealth of benefits not only to the GP tutors, but also the wider practice team - dedicating time to the development of the next generation of doctors can be energising and career-affirming for all colleagues involved. It also builds a collective sense of purpose, including with non-clinical colleagues, who are often delighted to have the opportunity to be involved in inspiring the next generation of doctors. Similarly, other clinicians in your practice can gain valuable experience in becoming involved in teaching, and there are opportunities to further develop these skills and knowledge supported by the University.

Having students on placement can contribute to an ethos of learning and education in the wider practice - something that has many broader benefits to working in primary care. It can contribute to promoting a positive and constructive culture which staff feel invested in and are proud of.

Partnership with patients

Our patients also value working in partnership with us to contribute to the education of students - and frequently feedback to tutors how much they enjoyed having the time and space to discuss their conditions. Involving the expertise of patients not only gives opportunity for learning and highly sought after feedback for students - but also can play a part in celebrating the crucial role general practice has in patient care.

Continuing Professional Development

We enjoy a great relationship with our GP tutors and teaching practices. We arrange a series of CPD events throughout the year, including year-group drop-in sessions. These are a great opportunity to catch up with other tutors and share any concerns and ideas about placements.

Each summer we hold a Primary Care Development Day which includes talks on medical education, tutor forums and workshops. This is an important opportunity to meet up with colleagues in Primary Care medical education and receive updates on the programme. We expect each teaching practice to release the GP tutors to attend this conference each year. More than one GP from a practice is welcome to attend, as we know many practices have different leads for each year group.

Become a University of Leeds Associated Teaching Practice

An agreement for practices has been formulated by the School of Medicine to emphasise the partnership with our teaching practices. It allows eligible practices to sign an agreement which sets out broader responsibilities both for the University and the practice. These practices are awarded the following status as ‘University of Leeds Associated Practices’ and are given a letter signed by the Dean of Medicine and a poster to display in the practice.

Take part in student OSCE examinations

We ask that all tutors offer to participate in annual OSCE exams and/or the Multiple Mini Interviews which form part of our admissions process. Taking part in the OSCEs is an aspect of teaching and assessment that our tutors really enjoy, allowing them to model their placement in line with the expectations and standards of each stage of the MBChB. Full training is provided by our CPD team.

Become a senior Honorary Tutor with the University of Leeds

All GP tutors who have been hosting students for 12 months or more are eligible to apply for Senior Honorary Lecturer status at the University of Leeds. This gives you access to University events and facilities, but also recognises your contribution to the education of the next generation of doctors.

Get all the support you need from our Primary Care Placements team

Our Primary Care Placements Team are on hand for any day to day support you may need throughout the year.

We also have a supportive Quality Assurance process which involves the regular review of our undergraduate teaching practices and placements. Students give feedback on each placement and this is collated and forwarded to lead tutors throughout the year. Students and tutors are able to raise concerns at any time and we will aim to address these as they arise. Each teaching practice will have an annual review. For this we require tutors to complete an assessment form, including reflections on teaching and student feedback. This form will be sent out in advance of the review and needs to be completed promptly. All new practices (within three years of starting undergraduate placements) and practices who teach multiple year groups of students will have an annual meeting to review the feedback. Any practices where concerns have been raised and/or they have received a red card via the Clinical Reporting Tool will also receive an annual visit. This is a supportive process, where we can help with any placement issues and educational development within the practice. In established practices where no issues have been identified, the review meeting will be every three years. Meetings can be in person or on Microsoft Teams.

Feedback generally looks at the components of the Quality Practice Standards and any free-text responses about the placement from the students.

Other Opportunities

We are always supportive of practices and tutors who would like to increase their involvement in healthcare education. Within the School of Medicine we also train a range of other healthcare professionals including Physician Associates. Clinical placement opportunities are available to host PA students in Year 1 and Year 2 of their studies. Please contact us for more information.

We will also keep you informed of career opportunities within the School of Medicine as we are always looking to expand our team of Primary Care medical educators. The University of Leeds and the Medical School are very research active and we may also contact you with research opportunities as they arise.