Welcome

The CRESH VTS scheme is based on the Crawley and East Surrey Hospitals.

 The 18 practices that provide the General Practice component of the VTS training are based in the northern part of West Sussex and the eastern part of Surrey centred around the towns of Crawley and Redhill. The scheme is a large scheme offering flexible training opportunities to meet your own personal development needs, tailored to your previous experience.

The area covered by the scheme is midway between London and the South Coast, about 35 minutes from Central London by train. Gatwick airport is in the centre of our patch and Brighton and the south coast 30 minutes away by car or train.

Crawley is an early example of the “New Towns” having been subject to significant expansion in the late 1950’s and 1960’s. Like Milton Keynes Crawley is famous for its roundabouts. The current population is around 100,000 and the proximity of Gatwick airport means that there is almost full employment. There is a wide mix of social and ethnic groups. The people who originally moved to the new town are now forming an ageing population and the age distribution of the area as a whole mirrors that of the UK.

Redhill and Reigate are the two towns to the north of the area covered by CRESH. They are old established towns just outside the M25. Although much of the population is prosperous there are areas of significant social deprivation within the borough.