Leading the way

Stowhealth provides a range of primary medical services in central Stowmarket – a market town in Suffolk, England. For those unfamiliar with this part of the world, it sits in between Bury St Edmunds and Ipswich.

My practice is a member of the Suffolk Primary Care super-partnership (SPC) of nine local practices, providing services to approximately 90,000 patients. Stowhealth is a prime example of a practice fully embracing the PA profession, evidenced in our five-strong line-up.

Dr Lauren Mercer, GP Partner at Stowhealth, understands how we’re playing a vital role in an ever-growing NHS. Lauren says:

Stowhealth have always valued having a mix of professionals and skills in our team, from paramedics, physios, pharmacists, nurse practitioners and PAs – they’ve all been hugely important to the way we run the practice. We employed our first physician associate in 2018 and have grown our team of PAs.

James

I was the first physician associate to start working at Stowhealth in 2018; at that time, I had just qualified, and there was only one PA working in the whole county of Suffolk.

I wasn’t sure if I wanted a job in primary care or hospital medicine, so I did both. I worked two days a week in Stowhealth and two days a week in a local hospital’s acute medical unit. After four years, I decided to pursue my career in primary care with Stowhealth. And here, I’ve had the honour of witnessing the PA team grow. I take particular pleasure in welcoming PA students to our surgery for their placements.