As a trainee GP, Dr Will Owen has already made a mark on the profession, leading the Next Generation GP scheme in London, a six-month programme for early-career GPs and trainees that aims to empower emerging leaders in general practice.
Some 90 participants have now completed the programme, he says.
His support for fellow trainees doesn’t end there. Dr Owen has backed a review of the future of GP training, with input from the BMA, the RCGP and Health Education England.
In a similar vein, he has represented student doctors in the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges’ review of postgraduate training, with the aim of strengthening the image of general practice as an accessible career.
He says he is driven by a motivation to improve training opportunities for GPs, and ‘ensure we have a system that prepares us for the future’.
During a year-long clinical fellow attachment with the primary care team at NHS England, Dr Owen has also been involved in a project to reduce workload.
But he says none of these achievements comes close to being his top moment of the past 12 months; that was when he became a father to his daughter Beatrix.
The rest of this year, he says, will be spent continuing to embrace the challenge of parenthood, and returning to his GP training in Buckinghamshire after finishing at NHS England.
What others say ‘I am particularly impressed by Dr Owen’s engagement with younger doctors in promoting general practice as a career’
