28 October 2019

RCGP Scotland comment on Increasing Undergraduate Education in Primary Care

Commenting on the release of Professor John Gillies' report on Undergraduate Medical Education in Scotland, Dr Carey Lunan, Chair of RCGP Scotland, said:

"It is essential that the Scottish Government does all it can to expand the GP workforce to manage the rising volume and complexity of their workload. This announcement will go some way towards achieving that.

We know that increased undergraduate exposure to general practice through high-quality placements is a key factor in influencing the career choice of medical students, so we are pleased to see that the Government has announced that an additional £5 million will be spent on GP education funding.

An increase in the tariff paid to GP practices towards the costs of teaching undergraduates will bring us more in line with the resource offered to hospitals to deliver medical student teaching and will enable more GP practices to be able to become involved with growing our future workforce."

Further Information
Fiona Murray
Interim RCGP Scotland Manager
020 3188 7746 / 07718 242 543

Notes
RCGP Scotland represents a network of around 5,000 family doctors in Scotland aiming to improve care for patients. We work to encourage and maintain the highest standards of general medical practice and act as the voice of GPs on resources, education, training, research and clinical standards.


**These figures do not include GPs that only work in out of hours services.

The Royal College of General Practitioners is a network of more than 53,000 family doctors working to improve care for patients. We work to encourage and maintain the highest standards of general medical practice and act as the voice of GPs on education, training, research and clinical standards.