Graduate Entry Medicine (GEM) is becoming increasingly popular every year – but the application process is not as straightforward as you would hope. This is why we have created this guide to explain everything to you.
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Medicine is notoriously difficult to be accepted into.
Whether you haven’t received any Medicine offers this year or are considering a career change, there is a path into this field through Graduate Entry Medicine.
But what exactly is this, and what does the application process involve?
Graduate Entry Medicine is a pathway into Medicine for graduates and degree-holders.
The first Graduate Medicine courses began over 20 years ago, with the first ones offered by St George’s in London and the joint Leicester – Warwick course. It’s now a popular route, with around half of the UK’s Medical Schools offering a GEM course.
A Medicine degree is usually five or six years; however, a Graduate Medicine course is usually accelerated so that it takes four years to complete.
In the UK, there are currently 19 Medical Schools offering Graduate Entry Medicine courses. Of these, 11 of them will consider applicants with non-science degrees.
Below, you can see which universities offer Graduate Entry Medicine courses, how many places they have each year, which admissions test they require, and whether you need to have a science degree to apply.
| University | Approx. Number of Places | What Admissions Test is Required? | Do They Accept Non-Science Degrees? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barts | 39 | UCAT | Yes |
| Birmingham | Not recruiting for 2023 entry. | UCAT | No |
| Cambridge | 39 | None. | Yes |
| Cardiff | Places are only for students on one of four Feeder Stream degree courses. | UCAT | No |
| Chester | New course – currently open to international applicants only. | UCAT | No |
| Dundee/St Andrew’s – ScotGEM | 55 | GAMSAT | Yes |
| Imperial College London | Currently suspended while curriculum is being updated. | UCAT | No |
| King’s College London | 28 | UCAT | No |
| Liverpool | 29 | GAMSAT | No |
| Newcastle | 25 | UCAT | Yes |
| Nottingham | 93 | GAMSAT | Yes |
| Oxford | 30 | UCAT | No |
| Sheffield | 15 | UCAT | No |
| Southampton | 48 | UCAT | Yes |
| St George’s | 70 | GAMSAT | Yes |
| Swansea | 100 | GAMSAT for UK applicants; GAMSAT or MCAT for international | Yes |
| Ulster | 30 | GAMSAT | Yes |
| Warwick | 193 | UCAT | Yes |
| Worcester | New course – currently open to international applicants only. | UCAT, GAMSAT or MCAT. | Yes |
We all know how notoriously difficult it is to get into Medical School but apply for GEM and the competition that you have to face increases massively.
Statistics show that GEM attracts around 10,000 applicants a year – making it the most competitive entry route into Medicine.
If we consider the University of Sheffield , for example, it has 17.6 applicants per place and 5.2 applicants per interview.
As another example of just how competitive GEM is, the University of Newcastle receives roughly 35 applicants per place. For interviews, it is around eight applicants per interview.
On its website Barts states that it receives over 1,500 applications for its GEM course, and there are only around 39 places available.
Swansea and Warwick only offer GEM and have more places available – with Warwick offering 193 – but it’s still incredibly competitive to get accepted.
You’ll be relieved to know that the GEM application process is virtually the same as that of the undergraduate course you’ve completed.
You apply through UCAS with a personal statement and reference in the same way you would have done for your first degree.
What is unique to Medicine degrees is the limit to the number of courses you can apply to as you’re only allowed to apply to four Medical Schools.
You will need to sit an admissions test as part of your application. Which Medical School requires which admissions test is listed above.
Finally, you’ll be invited to attend an interview, either an MMI or Panel where you should be prepared to discuss your undergraduate degree.
You should touch on what you learnt and what you enjoyed and give an overall reflection of your time at university.
Interviewers will be interested to know why you didn’t decide to study Medicine straightaway.
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As with any degree, the specific entry requirements for Graduate Entry Medicine vary depending on which course you’re applying to.
In general, though, you will need the following:
A really common question posed is whether you can do Graduate Entry Medicine with a non-science or humanities degree. The answer is that you absolutely can.
One of the best things about Graduate Entry Medicine is that the universities are looking for a bit of life experience and transferable skills in their students. The greatest tool a graduate student has is their maturity and experience, and you can gain both of those from a humanities or arts-based course as opposed to a pure science one.
As already mentioned above, 11 of the 19 Graduate Entry Medicine courses allow you to apply with a non-science degree.
Once again, these are:
A couple of these are brand-new Medical Schools, only just accepting their cohorts, mixed in with some of the well-established Medical Schools in the UK.
This should act as a reassurance that some of the best, and most well-known Medical Schools, respect and appreciate the different experiences that people with non-science degrees can bring to the Medical field.
However, though all of these Medical Schools do not require a science degree, some do place a lot of weight on your A-Levels.
If we consider Cambridge’s Graduate Entry Medicine course, for example, they will accept a 2:1 in any honours degree, but there are quite strong A-Level requirements. As well as having at least AAA grades applicants must have Chemistry at grade A or above and one of Biology, Physics or Mathematics.
On the other end of the scale, Newcastle accepts those with a 2:1 in any honours degree with no requirements around A-Levels and GCSEs. However, quite a high UCAT threshold is necessary (this is usually around the 3000 mark), with additional points for work experience volunteering.
It is possible to apply to study Graduate Entry Medicine without science A-Levels or GCSEs.
As mentioned above, one such place where you can do this is Newcastle.
Those applying to King’s College London do not require specific A-Levels or GCSEs – except if you are a Nursing graduate.
The University of Nottingham also does not score your school-leavers qualifications as part of your application (and actually has a lower degree minimum of 2:2).
For applicants to Barts, it is a little more complex, so it is important you check with them directly, as it depends on what degree you are applying with. For Bioscience degrees which contain sufficient Biology and Chemistry, there are no further A-Level requirements.
However, if you are applying with a non-science degree, candidates must have a minimum B grade in A-Level Chemistry or Biology, plus one other science also at grade B.
St George’s and Warwick are the final two Medical Schools that have no A-Level or GCSE requirements.
It will likely be disheartening to know that your personal statement won’t actually be scored by the Medical Schools you are applying to.
On the whole, they are required to prove that you have a genuine interest in Medicine and outline any work experience that you have undertaken.
A number of Medical Schools use them to help inform questions on non-academic areas if you are invited to attend an interview.
Oxford is an exception to this and considers your personal statement alongside the other application materials, including the course-specific online Oxford Application Form, UCAS application and references.