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Celebrating our long serving Partners
Three long serving GP Partners at The New Queen Street and Stanground Surgeries are clocking up a combined 60 years of service this year.
Dr Paula Spellar, ‘the mother of the practice,’ is celebrating her 30-years at Whittlesey on 1 March. Dr Ajay Patel will reach his 20-year milestone on 1 June, while Dr Katie Scott will have been there for a decade on 1 October.
The practice has a culture of growing and retaining its own talent, as well as being a training practice for medical students and GPs. Dr Spellar was one of the training supervisors for Dr Patel, and the duo, in turn, were both trainers for Dr Scott.
They have experienced many changes over the years, in terms of patient numbers, services offered, the pandemic, and the way that technology is being integrated into Primary Care. One of the earliest changes was the move from the original Queen Street surgery.
Dr Spellar said: ‘I am a bit nostalgic as Ajay and I used to work from 9 to 11 Queen Street, which were two Victorian villas knocked together. It was sweet but not really fit for purpose as there were two sets of stairs and no lift. That is why the current practice was built. There was talk of it being called The Sadler Surgery after our senior partner at the time, but then someone suggested New Queen Street. We thought it might cause chaos as we are not actually on Queen Street, but it didn’t, and it is nice having that nod back to our heritage.’
She trained in Glasgow in 1989 before doing her GP training in both Peterborough and Scotland: ‘I was one of the first GP Partners ever who hadn’t trained here. This was the practice everyone aspired to work at so it is nice to see us climbing back up the rankings again. When I started I was assigned the ante and post-natal checks and so now I have patients today that I remember being born.
‘Being a good GP is about knowing your patients. It is not necessarily that you have made a fabulous diagnosis or you have found a condition that only happens in one per cent of people, it is that you have listened and that patient felt better because of it.
‘It has also been great seeing the team change and grow. There are a whole lot of new roles and people around us in the healthcare sector, such as pharmacists, first contact physiotherapists and emergency care practitioners, as well as our own staff we have trained up, including the apprentices who joined ten years ago and who are now integral to our practice. It has been a real team effort over the years.’
Dr Ajay Patel who was born and brought up in Peterborough, does GP training, is also educational lead and a GP tutor for Cambridge University.
He said: ‘The GP training programme was what brought me to Queen Street because it has been a well-established training practice for many years and Paula was one of my trainers. One of the highlights for all of us, and what keeps you fresh, is the training. Having a fantastic team of colleagues helps as well!
‘The pace of General Practice has never allowed us to stagnate. It is always a different landscape and the key is to keep being flexible, adaptable and listening to the way things are changing. It is all about the patients, spending time getting to know them and I love the whole clinical aspect of listening to patients, being receptive to their needs and working out management plans with them. Each contact is a new opportunity – we may see hundreds of patients a week, but we are always mindful that we may be the only GP they have seen for a while, or for their condition.'
Dr Scott was educated and brought up in Peterborough and trained locally. She is a GP Educator and also the last trainee to have joined the practice as a Partner.
She said: ‘Over the years, and especially post-Covid, we have reinvented the way that we work, not just doing things in the way we have always done them. We are definitely a practice that likes to engage in new things to make improvements. You would be left behind if you don’t engage and move with the times and technology.
‘Being a good GP is rooted in human connection. We learn so much from body language, subtle cues and listening to what patients want, which is why our clinics are now predominantly face-to-face. Saving a life, while rare, is profoundly grounding and reminds you why you chose this profession, but more often the reward comes from seeing a patient leave feeling heard, reassured or supported, whatever they needed in that moment.
‘We are very well supported, from management through to the nursing and admin teams. We’ve helped the nurses and our ECP through their prescribing course, so there’s a strong culture of home-grown development. The team has definitely kept me here all these years. It’s hard to leave a place where you feel comfortable, invested, and where you understand how things work and your role within the team. When you feel like you’re making progress and moving forward together, it’s hard to see why you’d want to go anywhere else.’
Lakeside Chief Executive Jess Bawden said: ‘It is wonderful that we have been able offer 60 years of continuity of care to the patients of Whittlesey and Stanground. Congratulations, Dr Spellar, Dr Patel and Dr Scott!’
Published: Feb 26, 2026