Scottish Medical Training

The Renal Medicine South East Scotland Programme is based in Edinburgh hospitals with placement in Lothian, Fife and Borders; Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, Victoria Hospital, Kirkcaldy and Borders General Hospital, Melrose.

South East Scotland trainees rotate through attachments to acute nephrology, general nephrology, transplantation, and dialysis, while maintaining continuing commitments to outpatient clinics, unit meetings and teaching. If staffing levels are sufficient then it may be possible to gain some nephrology experience in Victoria Hospital, Kirkcaldy; some of your GIM will be there too. Many trainees take a research break but this is not compulsory. 

Most training centres offer comparable experience, though we believe that we have particular advantages:

• Excellent clinical teams, experiences, and training with an international name
• Excellent transplant unit undertaking renal, pancreatic and liver and islet cell transplantation, jointly managed with very good collaboration and relationships with the surgical team
• Most of the time you'll be located in Edinburgh, and even while in Fife, commuting is not difficult
• One of the strongest academic renal groups in the UK, with very good interactions with the renal and transplant services
• Strong track record and interest in undergraduate and postgraduate education, and writing textbooks
• The www.edren.org website, possibly the most-read renal resource in the UK. Our info pages and also our protocols are read worldwide
• Outstanding opportunities 
• And it's a lovely place to live

 We have a thriving research culture in the department with strong University links. Most of our trainees take time out of programme to pursue a higher research degree. Many do basic science research in the University where there is a traditional strong nephrology presence and our trainees have a stellar track record in securing funding from national bodies. There are also ample opportunities for clinical research and in recent years research fellow posts in both nephrology and transplantation have been created with a focus more on clinical research but often with a laboratory component.

A regular specialty trainee teaching program is in place in Edinburgh as well as a trainee journal club. There are also many opportunities to deliver formal teaching to junior colleagues and medical students and we encourage our trainees to achieve training and recognition for this. There are also plenty of opportunities for audit, both in-house and nationally, as are involved in several Scotland wide projects with links to the Scottish Renal Registry.

Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh

Victoria Hospital, Kirkcaldy

Borders General Hospital, Melrose