Different Medical School Courses

There are many types of medical degree course, but the majority fit into one of four main types.

Different medical schools sometimes offer more than one type of course, so you need to spend time researching what best fits your needs.

1. Standard Entry
Standard entry medical school usually begins immediately after doing your A-levels or equivalent. It is usually a 5 or 6-year course, leading to the award of the BMBS (sometimes abbreviated to MBBS) degrees. BMBS stands for Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery. Some universities award the MBChB. This is in essence exactly the same award, but is the expressed in Latin: Medicinae Baccalaureus, Baccalaureus Chirurgiae. Southampton, uniquely, awards just a BM: Bachelor of Medicine. While they all have slightly different names, the end result is exactly the same: a bachelor’s degree in medicine that allows you to gain provisional registration with the General Medical Council.
While the usual programme of study at most universities is a 2-year pre-clinical course, followed by 3-years of clinical school, a 6-year degree allows you to have an additional year – sometimes called an intercalated year – to obtain a Bachelor of Science (BSc) degree in an area of particular interest. Different medical schools offer different intercalated degrees (and at Oxford and Cambridge, the 6th year is a compulsory part of the course). If this is particularly important to you (especially if you are interested in the possibility of a career in medical research) it would be worth investing time finding out what further degrees each medical school offers, and seeing if they fit your areas of interest, before making your university applications.

2. Graduate Entry
Shortened graduate entry courses are available in some universities. Applications to these courses are often heavily over-subscribed, and the minimum educational requirement is usually a previous bachelors’ degree with at least a 2.1, although some universities say they will accept a 2.2.
The course itself is usually an accelerated degree, completed in 4 years, although some universities offer a traditional 5-year course. Graduate-entry degrees are usually open to UK graduates only and, because of the shortened nature of the course, can be very intense.

Most universities cap at a comparatively low level the number of graduate entrants they will take each year, and winning a place is just as competitive as standard entry, if not more so, given the relative scarcity of places.
If you are interested in graduate-entry medicine, you should remember that second degrees are often not fully supported by Government loans or bursaries. Students resident in England and Wales will be expected to make some contribution towards their tuition fees, although not the full amount. Students resident in Scotland and studying in Scotland will have their tuition fees paid for them, whereas students in Northern Ireland will be expected to pay full tuition fees themselves.

3. Medicine with a Foundation Year
This is a 5-year standard-entry course, but with an additional, foundation, year at the start, often for those students who have not studied the required science A-levels, or else have missed the required entry grades. The foundation year plugs the scientific gaps that you will need to succeed on the degree proper.
Once the foundation year is successfully completed, you then progress to the standard 5-year programme (or 6-yr, if you elect to include an intercalated BSc). The medicine with foundation year courses are usually open to UK or EU citizens only.

4. Medicine with a Gateway Year
Similar in principle to the Foundation Year programmes, Gateway Year medical degrees are a Widening Participation initiative designed to facilitate access to Medicine for those from under-represented backgrounds who demonstrate high academic ability and motivation. Entrance criteria are commonly adjusted on a case-by-case basis, and eligibility is usually restricted to UK students only.
Just like the Foundation Year programmes, the Gateway Year provides intensive tuition in basic sciences, following which students join the regular 5-year degree course (or 6 years, if including an intercalated BSc).