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Foundation Year 1 and 2

Warrington and Halton Hospitals is a friendly trust providing a wide range of specialties including accident & emergency, anaesthetics, general medicine and elderly care, pathology, radiology, general surgery, orthopaedics, ophthalmology, ENT, urology, paediatrics and obstetrics & gynaecology.

 

With over 630 beds spread across the three sites at Warrington and Halton hospitals, we are an excellent choice for foundation trainees and a great place to develop your career in medicine.

The foundation programme is a two year fixed term contract at a hospital following medical school.  In 2023 in line with the national expansion to programme we are holding 39 posts with further expansion in 2024 to 42 posts. 
  
The main purpose is to gain experience in multiple specialities via 4 monthly rotations over the course of two years.  Specialities include Medicine, Surgery, Trauma & Orthopaedics and Psychiatry

At FY1 level the doctor has a provisional GMC license to practice.  At the end of the first year the FY1 undergoes an assessment called ARCP (Annual Review of Competencies and Progression) if satisfactory and the FY1 has completed the equivalent of 12 months experience  they are awarded a F1CC certificate of completion allowing them to apply for full GMC registration and move into the 2nd year as an FY2 doctor.  

For further information please see https://www.nwpgmd.nhs.uk/foundation-training 

Applications are submitted via Oriel - Home

Information on our tracks 

On arrival in the Trust Foundation Year 1 doctors participate in a six day induction programme before they take up their posts, including two days shadowing current F1s, clinical skills and resuscitation training, a Prescribing workshop and IT. You will be paid for these six days and attendance is mandatory. Foundation doctors are also assigned a buddy who has completed similar rotations to them, to help ease the transition from student to doctor. All Foundation Doctors are automatically members of our Doctor’s Mess.

Our clinical skills facility is located at Halton Hospital and an early emphasis on clinical skills in foundation teaching means that almost all the core protected teaching for F1 and F2 doctors is based at Halton for the first 2 months. After these sessions the teaching will take place in Warrington.

During FY2 year the doctor has more autonomy and enters more specialised areas such as Surgery, Psychiatry,  ITU, ED, O&G, Public health & GP  to gain experience in more specialised areas of interest. 
 
Presently we have 36 FY2 posts and in line with the national expansion to programme from 2024 we will have 39 posts with further expansion in 2025 to 42 posts. 

Following completion of their FY2 year doctors are awarded a FPCC certificate following ARCP, after this doctors usually go into specialised training programmes or take a gap year to travel / gain locum experience. 

Sometimes doctors apply for the F2 standalone programme as they may have initially trained abroad but need to complete the F2 year in the UK in order to progress into speciality training. 

Applications are done via Oriel - Home

Information on our tracks 

The foundation teaching programme provides half a day’s teaching each week for F1s and F2s. Teaching is delivered by a mixture of consultants, senior and junior trainees and other members of the multidisciplinary teams. This is all supplemented by departmental teaching during each rotation.

All of this teaching is protected and bleep free. Trainees are required to achieve 70% attendance at teaching.

In line with all training grade doctors, foundation doctors have an Educational Supervisor who remains with them for the whole year, and a Clinical Supervisor who will change each time you rotate. You will undertake Supervised Learning Events (SLEs) via the Horus e-portfolio system. Trainees meet with their supervisor at least twice during each rotation to plan and assess their progress during the rotation. Trainees must progress satisfactorily in each post to receive their FACD (Foundation Achievement of Competency Document) in order to progress to specialist training in the specialty of their choice.

In addition to the core protected teaching, you will have the opportunity to attend teaching on careers and interview skills and our proactive medical education team can provide you with many opportunities to develop your teaching skills with our 4th and 5th year medical students right from the earliest days of your F1 year.

If you would like to find out more about the Foundation Programme please contact: