GP Registrar Training - Residential

Held at Hoar Cross Hall – 15th - 16th September 2005.

This years residential took place at Hoar Cross Hall on September 15th / 16th – a beautiful spa hotel in a stately home in Staffordshire.

All the registrars attended.

On the first day, we looked at communication skills with the emphasis on telephone consultations.  We began with a round of introductions and established every-ones aims for the day and a half.

Our first exercise was a communications exercise involving “blind modeling” with play-role.

This was followed by an exercise involving trust, in which registrars took turns to be guided whilst blindfolded around the gardens – using verbal instructions only.

The feedback from the exercise concentrated on the importance of careful use of language.  Parallels were drawn with how this could be applied to telephone consulting.

After coffee, we explored the meaning of jargon and its implications for good communication with patients.  We followed this with an exercise in which registrars took turns to role-play explaining common medical conditions without using any jargon.

We then had an enjoyable hours archery lesson as a group followed by lunch.

In the afternoon, we explored telephone consultations in more depth.  In group work, we generated a lot of suitable scenarios for telephone consulting in general practice.   We then role-played these in 2 small groups.

To end the afternoon, we had a friendly competition to build a tower out of newspapers with a prize of chocolate for the tallest tower.  The winning tower was over 10 feet tall.

We then had a break before dinner for everyone to enjoy the beautiful spa facilities of the hotel.

We had an enjoyable residential dinner followed by games in the bar.

On the second day, we did a group exercise with everyone giving a 5 minute presentation of something that interested them.  We had a rich variety of topics ranging from travel experiences to the history of the “Ashes”.

The residential concluded with a review of the initial aims and a feed back and forward planning session.

We had a group photo and said “goodbye”

Dr. Hilary Morrison

Dr. Marcus Sanzeri

Medical Educators

22nd September 2005