On Wednesday 25/10/23 Helen Reid and Charise Boal, alongside QUBGP colleagues, hosted a lunchtime update session for Practices hosting Y4 students.

This had been arranged as an opportunity to address questions and share preliminary feedback (from Practices and students) after all Year 4 students had spent their initial two weeks in GP.

Helen started by thanking all host Practices for making the ambitious Year 4 programme possible. She went on to share some ‘ballpark benchmarking’ information (at student not Practice level) collected earlier that week while all Year 4 students were back on QUB Campus. She acknowledged that a key issue perceived by students has been the variability in GP placement experiences. We appreciate the reality that 317 students hosted across >90 different Practices (of different sizes, physical and working set ups…) will never have a standardised experience, but have to acknowledge the ‘it’s not fair’ perceptions that learners can perceive.

Acknowledging again that this was informally gathered data (approx. 250 responses but this varied question to question), Helen shared some graphs outlining the range of experiences across some aspects of Year 4 GP placements. For example, the vast majority of students reported that their ‘typical’ GP day was 9/9.30 - 4.30/5pm. The students’ top ‘highlight’ was undoubtedly the opportunity to consult, and their top ‘lowlight’ was an excess of administrative tasks. Questions addressed included clarifying that QUB Year 4 students do not automatically (as is the case in Years 1 and 2) have Wednesday afternoons ‘off’ for Sport/recreation, and that there is the option (should GP Tutors wish to do so; but there is no obligation around this) to add a comment to the cases that students enter into the GP consultations section of MyProgress. The full recording of the 45 minute session is available HERE

The team noted that students will formally provide feedback on their Year 4 GP placement experiences at the mid and end points of the academic year.

For any queries regarding Y4 placements contact Charise Boal at charise.boal@qub.ac.uk