Why the East of England?
Living Here
The East of England is a popular area to settle. It boasts unspoiled countryside, miles of beautiful beaches and is home to many unique species of wildlife. We have the bustle of city life, the tranquility of village life, and everything in between. Our landscape offers great opportunities for outdoor activities with many lakes, rivers, and the broads for water sports, many bridle paths for equestrians or a good walk, and forests and woodlands for great adventures.
With an average journey time of 1 hour right into the heart of central London, the East of England is increasingly affordable the further from London you settle, giving you the opportunity to create an affordable base with a high quality of living, yet keeping in touch with London life.
London is not the only city. We have the academic city of Cambridge, known for its colleges, museums and punting on the backs. Cambridge also hosts a busy shopping district, many fantastic restaurants, and an active nightlife scene.
Norwich is something of a hidden jewel, with many trainees electing to stay and return there wherever possible due to its affordability with all the expected conveniences of city life.
Throughout East of England there are excellent transport links with M1 in the west, the A1 and M11 more centrally, and the A12 in the East, but also to the west via the A14 with access to the North. Our rail links predominantly lead to London, but the hub at Peterborough opens to the north and the west. There are small airports such as the city airports in Cambridge and Norwich, but our biggest international airports are London Stanstead and London Luton Airport making overseas travel a breeze.
Working Here
Healthcare delivery is changing rapidly, as are the portfolio careers and options available to newly qualified doctors. We provide you with the training that gives you the flexible skills, both clinical and non-clinical, to achieve your goals. We are constantly working with our educators and trusts to listen to trainee feedback and improve our programmes. We believe that we maintain an excellent foundation programme that focused on individual training needs as well as providing quality patient care.
We have three key themes for foundation training in the East of England:
Excellence in education. We aspire to create a focussed, delivered educational programme of 60 mandatory hours per year per trainee that is both covering the curriculum and also inspiring. Additionally, there are 30 further hours of study leave. Education is delivered through a mixture of local taught programmes and mandated simulation delivered sessions. One of our innovations in 2018, the new sub-regional or Hub delivered training events had excellent trainee feedback enabling this to run more smoothly in future years. For 2019 we bought 2 oculus rift and associated hi spec computers to run virtual reality simulation in each trust for our foundation doctors.
Trustworthy training rotations. Each year is hosted by a single trust (although community placements will rotate out). The exception being Papworth rotations, which are matched with the adjoining Addenbrookes hospital. All our rotations have been 'sense checked' for depth and breadth and community placement. We work with our hospitals to provide solutions that maintain training and education. Our Foundation Training Programme Directors (FTPD) in each trust are there for your assistance.
Personalising support. Becoming a doctor can be tough, and we want to help this go smoothly. We have a mentorship programme to support the step from medical student to doctor, resilience training workshops, careers and professional workshops. We are supportive of those requiring “Less Than Full Time” (LTFT) training and if required time out of training or inter-foundation school transfers.
For our new to the UK doctors, we provide an extended induction - paid! This includes shadowing at their Trust of work, and a custom made course including simulation, communication skills, and understanding how the NHS works.
We also have an excellent Professional Support and Wellbeing service for those that need a little more support.
[Photographs of EBH and EAFS trainees with consent by Elinor French, independent photographer. Copyright HEE EoE]
Our Programmes
Our rotations across the trusts can be viewed on Oriel. We have several exciting placement opportunities in the region.
Generalism, a trailblazer in the East of England, Generalism posts are available throughout the region, see The School of Generalism for more details about this new and exciting opportunity to be involved with and help us develop the future of doctor training.
Unique opportunities to shape the future of Public Health are available at West Suffolk Hospital (Bury St Edmunds), Watford General Hospital, Southend University Hospital and Royal Papworth Hospital. In addition, there are new opportunities in fast evolving specialties such as Digital Health (QEH King’s Lynn Hospital, Norfolk and Norwich Hospital). Colchester Hospital is offering opportunities for involvement in Medical Education and Widening Access to healthcare.
Specialty placements are available in Intensive Care (ITU) at Princess Alexandra Hospital (Harlow), Addenbrookes/Papworth Royal (Cambridge), Colchester Hospital, Peterborough Hospital.
In addition to the ITU posts there are opportunities in Anaesthetics in Ipswich, Peterborough, Luton and Harlow.
Unique in the East of England, and very rare in foundation, we have a rotation containing OMFS at PAH Harlow (suitable for those dual trained in medicine and dentistry or for those considering dentistry training and wanting to confirm an interest in OMFS before going ahead).
Opportunities are also available across the region in Neurosurgery, Rehabilitation Medicine, Plastic Surgery, Transplant Surgery.
Recruitment
Recruitment is through the national process on ORIEL for both the two-year and standalone programmes. National recruitment is a large, resource heavy requirement and the dates are fixed. Please see https://foundationprogramme.nhs.uk for definitive details and timelines.
IT IS REALLY IMPORTANT THAT YOU READ THE APPLICANT HANDBOOK AND FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS.
There are now multiple elements to the foundation programme - all through a single oriel application form. Please see the applicant handbook and presentation on the UKFPO pages
Doctors on a provisional license are only allowed to work within a nationally recruited post (not a trust recruited post), please refer to the following website: www.gmc-uk.org/education we also have a short presentation supporting this
If you require further information:
We have small shared centralised teams, who may be unable to provide swift responses or have the answer to your query. So, if you require information, please review all relevant pages and documents on this website, in the first instance. If you are still unable to find the answer to your query, please contact the Recruitment Team for assistance.
If you have queries around specific placements please contact the trusts, not the central team.
If you require adjustments to the workplace or LTFT, then please contact one of the deputy Foundation School Directors.
General Information
All our programmes have been configured to make sure that they are broad and balanced. We have also minimised rotations between acute trusts within each Foundation year. Our posts can be viewed on ORIEL. Please be aware that posts may be held back for our LTFT trainees who require an additional year.
As always, the posts on Oriel are indicative, so that you must check the National Application Posts in full not just post numbers or summary. The NHS is an ever-changing system and even after being matched to an individual programme, there will be situations when placements within that programme may change because of service redesign, trainee feedback, working time directive regulations or national directives (UK-wide). Although we aim to minimise this, on rare occasions the placements will need to change. Also, to be noted, is that only minimal post descriptors are on Oriel, so the posts may include other specialties, be part based with a theme in the area stated and may cross cover acute areas. Please discuss specifics with the trusts.
Most two-year rotations have a community placement, this may be in GP, Psychiatry, Palliative Care or other. For many of these you will need to consider your mode of transport. Some of the trusts have highlighted posts where they think driving is required.
For those with workplace adjustments required such that driving is not an option, please highlight this in your pre-allocation and we will look to make the requisite adjustments. For those who do not require reasonable adjustments in the workplace, then please carefully choose your rotations, consider learning to drive, review public transport options, or consider whether you will move to help complete that rotation.
Equality and Diversity
The Foundation Schools seek to provide an inclusive environment which values diversity and maintains a training environment in which the rights and dignity of all its junior doctors are respected to assist them in reaching their full potential.
No prospective applicant or trainee will be treated more or less favourably than any other at any stage on one or more of the following grounds: age; disability; ethnicity; marital status; nationality; national origin; parental status; religion or belief; gender; or sexual orientation, except when such treatment is within the law and determined by lawful requirements.
If you have a complaint relating to your training on any of the above grounds you should inform your Foundation Training Programme Director immediately and also the Foundation School Director.
If there is an opportunity for us to promote equity and social justice within our school, or something we could improve upon, please also contact us. Each year we appoint one of our foundation representatives with a brief of inclusivity.
We hope you will want to join us in the East of England but, wherever you apply, we wish you the best for your foundation years and that you can go forwards in your career with confidence.