{"id":268362,"date":"2025-11-07T07:59:23","date_gmt":"2025-11-07T07:59:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/268362\/"},"modified":"2025-11-07T07:59:23","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T07:59:23","slug":"could-homegrown-doctors-become-the-rural-gps-of-the-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/268362\/","title":{"rendered":"Could homegrown doctors become the rural GPs of the future?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Giancarlo RinaldiSouth Scotland reporter<\/p>\n

\"BBCBBC<\/p>\n

Musa Zahir is one of the Crichton Cohort of students in Dumfries<\/p>\n

A new group of students in south-west Scotland could become a crop of homegrown doctors to help tackle long-term issues finding GPs in rural areas.<\/p>\n

It is part of an agreement between the University of West Scotland (UWS), which has a base in Dumfries, and the universities of Dundee and St Andrews.<\/p>\n

There are 17 people in total in the first Crichton Cohort – named after the campus where they will undertake their studies.<\/p>\n

The institutions involved hope the move can help address “local problems with local solutions”. <\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

A new deal was signed between the University of the West of Scotland and the universities of Dundee and St Andrews<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Heather Knaggs hopes to become a homegrown GP in Dumfries and Galloway<\/p>\n

Heather Knaggs is from Ayr originally but has lived in Dumfries for many years and considers it an “enormous privilege” to have the chance to complete a medical degree.<\/p>\n

She said the role of the GP was an important one in such a rural area.<\/p>\n

“I think particularly that generalist care is so important because we’re remote from tertiary services,” she said.<\/p>\n

“So the more exposure that we can have during our training to different scenarios and different specialisms is really important.<\/p>\n

“But I think that rural community care is so special and so important, getting to know your patients and their stories is really powerful.”<\/p>\n

She still works as a pharmacist at weekends but said she was “really lucky” to be able to study close to home.<\/p>\n

“I see myself as hopefully a GP working in this region – I feel like a homegrown GP so it would be really fantastic to get there,” Ms Knaggs added.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/p>\n

The UWS site in Dumfries offers access to state of the art training<\/p>\n

Musa Zahir has come a little further to join the group.<\/p>\n

He is from Woking and previously studied at Swansea University.<\/p>\n

Mr Zahir was attracted by the opportunity to tackle the “health disparities and social inequalities” faced by rural areas.<\/p>\n

He is unsure if he would want to be a GP at the end of his studies but is definitely keen to tackle the issues faced outside of the bigger cities.<\/p>\n

“I’m not actually quite sure being in quite an early stage, but I was thinking more along the lines of emergency or acute medicine in a rural or semi-rural setting,” he said.<\/p>\n

“This is only my second week in Dumfries, but it seems like a lovely area.<\/p>\n

“The teaching has been great so far, and the commitment from NHS Dumfries and Galloway has been very good.<\/p>\n

“I’m quite privileged to be able to learn in this area.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Flora Scarabello said she was looking forward to exploring Dumfries and Galloway<\/p>\n

Flora Scarabello is originally from Falkirk but has been living in St Andrews.<\/p>\n

She too has been impressed by her first contact with Dumfries.<\/p>\n

“It’s a lovely looking area and I’m looking forward to exploring it a bit more,” she said.<\/p>\n

“I’ve been very impressed so far by DGRI, the hospital here.<\/p>\n

“I think they’re very well organised, certainly all of our placements and so on.<\/p>\n

“It’s remarkable really how much thought and care has gone into preparing all of this for us.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

UWS principal James Miller said the students would become the doctors of Dumfries and Galloway in future<\/p>\n

UWS principal and vice-chancellor James Miller said the signing of the partnership with ScotGEM – a four-year graduate-entry medical programme – was “yet another example of universities collaborating across different districts to benefit local communities”.<\/p>\n

He added: “In this case, it’s about ensuring that we have a cohort of graduate doctors who are able to train locally and thus in the future stay locally in order to provide healthcare services to the local community.<\/p>\n

“What we are creating here is a cohort of doctors.<\/p>\n

“We’re going to name them the Crichton Cohort so that there’s a very clear identity, a very clear sense of belonging and a very clear sense that they will be the doctors in Dumfries and Galloway of the future.”<\/p>\n

Dr Sara Proudfoot of NHS Dumfries and Galloway said the health board was “delighted” to see the partnership develop.<\/p>\n

“It’s a positive step towards growing our own future workforce and ensuring that communities across Dumfries and Galloway continue to benefit from dedicated, locally-trained professionals,” she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Giancarlo RinaldiSouth Scotland reporter BBC Musa Zahir is one of the Crichton Cohort of students in Dumfries A…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":268363,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[64,63,137,500],"class_list":{"0":"post-268362","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}