Scottish Medical Training

Internal Medicine Training in Scotland is delivered on a regional basis in the North, South-East, East and West of Scotland. Each region has a different range of hospitals and training experiences from busy urban district general hospitals, large regional specialty centres, renowned teaching hospitals, to remote and rural sites, all of which provide valuable and unique clinical experiences.

Although your clinical training is regionally based, the training programme directors in Scotland work together to provide a teaching programme for all internal medicine trainees, along with an intensive simulation programme for each of the years of internal medicine. You will meet with other trainees from all over Scotland at bootcamp in year 1 at the national simulation centre in Larbert, and also at our face to face events for quality improvement and national trainee conferences. The regular clinical teaching programme is delivered online with monthly afternoon sessions which are recorded and you will have access to the whole teaching programme which is designed on a three year rolling programme to cover the IMT syllabus. There are also national palliative medicine teaching sessions in addition to your attachment to palliative medicine teams during your clinical training.

Your study leave budget is supplemented in Scotland with additional separate funding for clinical simulation so this does not impact on your personal study leave choices. The simulation programme is highly valued by trainees and has been described as the best clinical teaching ever experienced by previous trainees. There is a three-day bootcamp in year 1, a clinical skills day in year 2 and a two-day registrar ready course in year 3. The clinical teaching programme is delivered over and above this budget with expert speakers from all over Scotland and trainee feedback of these sessions is excellent.

Although CoVID has impacted clinical training in all areas, we are working hard to make sure that your training experience is excellent and supportive. Scotland is an amazing place to work and we hope to have you join us.

Trainees have opportunities to be involved in both supervised clinical audit and research projects whilst attached to both University Hospital Ayr and University Hospital Crosshouse. 

We encourage trainees to participate in our chief registrar programme and are supportive to trainees wishing to develop their leadership and managerial skills. 

Teaching opportunities exist at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels for trainees who come to Ayrshire. Students from the University of Glasgow are attached to our medical units normally for 5 to 10 weeks. Undergraduate teaching within Ayrshire consistently receives excellent feedback. It is well supported by our education, simulation and resuscitation centre team. 

The consultant physicians are dedicated to providing high quality teaching and training. A regular weekly specialty and medical unit teaching programme exists and we encourage trainees to contribute to the delivery of this. The consultant physicians also provide teaching and support to candidates working towards MRCP. Given the broad range of medical specialties available in Ayrshire and Arran, there are extensive learning opportunities to facilitate this.