Midway through your ST2 year you will be asked to make a choice about the training practice you would like to spend your ST3 year in.

Many VTS schemes do not give trainees a choice of practice, instead choosing to allocate trainees. Please therefore respect the benefits that you get from this process and the principles behind it. Choice of practices is not a trainee right that is guaranteed.

In order to fairly distribute ST3 trainees across our widely spread training practices the VTS and the trainers have agreed the following process.

• A certain number of practice places will be released for each cohort of trainees to choose from. This will be equal to, or slightly more than the total number of trainees seeking a practice. The places released will be based on numbers of previous ST3 placements at that practice. It is therefore possible that one year a practice may have more or fewer places released for ST3 trainees than in previous years. This is to ensure fair shares of ST3’s across the patch training practices.

Sending e-mails, meeting or other efforts to influence trainers/TPDs and admin staff to open up additional training places in a practice of your choosing will not be effective and may result in you losing the right to choose at all.

It is worth noting that all training practices have been visited and approved and all trainers have shown a high level of commitment to get the necessary training and approval to become a trainer. To choose your practice based purely on what is geographically convenient, does a disservice to this level of commitment.

• You will be asked to rank a given list of practices.
• It is essential that you visit your top three preferenced practices, and ideally meet the trainers who would be supervising you at the practices you select. This is to ensure that you are compatible. The trainee/trainer relationship is key to success in the ST3 year.
• If there are a number of trainers at the practice, it would be best to meet the person who would be supervising you but if this is not known at the time, then any trainer is acceptable.
• We will allocate practices based on a number of factors, including your ranking at your selection for GP training, but please be reminded that it is in no way a guarantee and the deanery team reserve the right to place trainees where they feel is most appropriate.
• If there are significant factors (e.g. caring responsibilities or mobility issues) which mean that you would benefit from being placed within a specific geographic area (e.g. W Devon, S Hams etc.), please include this information on your completed form. If you are not placed at your top three preferenced practices, we will do our very best to those factors into account.
• Where possible, you will be placed in one of your top three preferenced practices but if this isn’t possible, we will do our best to take your ranking of the remaining practices into account.

We hope that this is seen as a transparent and fair system. Please be reminded that it is in no way a guarantee, and the Peninsula PGME team reserve the right to place trainees where they feel is most appropriate.

When choosing a practice we would encourage you to look visit the practice websites, which are linked from the Peninsula PGME website – link below. Look at a map. Think what type of practice you want, e.g. large v small, rural v urban v suburban, geography and demographics of the practice area, interests and characters of the trainers and team at the practice etc. Some of this will be apparent from the website, but some will need you to make an appointment with the practice manager or trainer and visit. Chatting to your peers in years above can be a good source of information, and the programme directors also know the practices well and can offer diplomatic advice, if requested. 

Click here for a link to all our training practices on the Peninsula PGME website.