Taunton and Somerset Foundation Trust is the southernmost department on the Severn training programme and also receives trainees from the Peninsula deanery. It is a "typical DGH" department seeing the full range of emergency presentations and covering a catchment of 350,000 patients with 60,000 patient attendances per year. There are nine consultants, providing cover 16 hrs per day, seven days a week. Registrars and non-training grades provide 24 hour cover. Approximately 13,000 children attend the department each year and two of the consultants are dually accredited in Paediatric Emergency Medicine. Other special interests include Emergency Medicine Ultrasound with Dr. Paul Baines who is a nationally recognised trainer, research - Dr James Gagg, and trauma - Dr. Gillian Bryce.
Musgrove Park Hospital is the PCI centre for the whole county, is a trauma unit and has all specialties other than neurosurgery, plastic surgery and cardio-thoracics on site.
As a consequence of the interests and activities of the ED consultants and its geographical location, Taunton hosts both the annual & monthly critical appraisal training day and biannually with Exeter hosts the regional EM research day.
The department has always been keen to support EM at a national level and currently provides both the President of the Royal College and the National Director of Revalidation.
Within the department training is embedded into the middle grade timetable, attendance at Regional training is mandatory and current research projects include HALT-IT, CRASH3, RAMPP, BEST and fracture free, with more paediatric based research likely in the future.
Taunton has much to offer an EM trainee, particularly those more minded to treat agricultural injuries with an ISS score of >16 rather than self-administered narcotics overdoses with a respiratory rate <6.