The Royal Crescent and Preston Road Practice has over 100 years of experience in providing primary care services to patients.  It is a large practice with 18,300 patients and a practice area that covers the whole of Weymouth apart from the Chickerell area to the west. The practice operates from 2 purpose built surgery premises, the main surgery in the centre of Weymouth close to the seafront and the branch surgery in the leafy suburbs of Preston.

The practice has an excellent reputation with its patients and with the many agencies and providers that it works with to provide high quality care.  Over the years the practice has influenced the shape of healthcare services in Dorset. We are currently involved in Health and Social projects to get better working relationships for the benefit of our patients.

There are 13 partners all of whom are committed to the provision of quality personal care for their patients.  They are forward thinking and not afraid of progress if it is in their patients’ best interests.

The practice has an impressive knowledge about the health needs of the population and has done a huge amount of mapping and analysis of local and regional statistics.  The Practice is at the forefront of the work to improve understanding in this area to become more responsive to patient needs and to provide more cost effective quality health care.

We run a Carers Group and have close links with the local Community Centre and Community groups. We provide a service for the Homeless and well as for those with Drug and Alcohol problems.

We also have 2 Nurse Practitioners who perform a minor illness and long term condition service, including prescribing and 2 Nurse Practitioners who run various clinics and co-ordinated care in Nursing and Residential Homes.

The interests and outside commitments of partners vary from PCT Board members, PCT Leads for IT, Prescribing and Learning Disabilities, particular expertise in Cardiology, Diabetes, COPD, Dermatology, Oncology as well as Weymouth RNLI HMA. 

Primary Health Care Team  (PHCT)

We have a large multi-skilled practice nursing team with the range of nurse-led clinics for Chronic Disease Management and in-house Health Visitors, District Nurses, and Midwife clinics. We have close connections Social Services and our Mental Health teams. We provide full family planning, maternity, minor surgery, child health surveillance, Smoke Stop and travel medicine as well as a teenage health service, in conjunction with the Health Visitors.  The practice makes every effort to provide arrangements that support employees fairly in balancing their work commitments with their home life by providing work patterns that are flexible and responsive to family commitments where possible.

Extended Primary Care Arrangements

We have an extended primary care contract with the PCT, and through this provide counselling, osteopathy, chiropody, and extended minor surgery.   We also have links to the Community Mental Health Team with a CPN and Child Psychologist providing an early intervention service at the surgery.  We are a pilot site for the Increasing Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) project, which aims to provide direct access for patients to an extended menu of practice-based and community services.

Training Practice

We are a dedicated and established teaching practice and have been taking trainee GPs for over 30 years. We like to have a trainee in post throughout the year as we believe it improves the quality of care we deliver.  Learning and teaching is a two way process and the trainees help to keep us all up to date and challenge our practice. We are well organised and able to teach the clinical, organisational and management side of General Practice. Our computer databases allow good access to data to examine our practice and learn from it.

Our Trainees are seen very much as a part of the practice team and are accepted very well by staff and patients alike. We are all involved in training and committed to the one to one training that is so important in GP training.