Talk:Medical school in the United Kingdom

Intercalated Degrees at London Medical Schools
It is not mandatory to take an intercalated degree at London Medical Schools, and so not all doctors qualified from the university of London automatically have a BSc/BA etc in addition to their MBBS qualification. However, the intercalated degree programme does seem to be more popular in London than at other medical schools. Tomriddington (talk) 14:38, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

BMedSci Degrees at Nottingham
The status of the BMedSci degree has been clarified and factually corrected. Its stature in relation to intercalated degrees elsewhere has been factually corrected. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.243.220.22 (talk) 08:39, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Canadian Medicine
"Noteably, universities that pioneered successful PBL such as McGill or McMaster in Candada are themselves prestigous institutions that hold worldwide reputations for clinical and academic excellence"

In Canada, the most successful PBL based programs are not in McGill. While McMaster was the first to implement this form of education, certain limitations in their program (of only 3 years) render in difficult to compare to other PBL based courses. Next, McGill is not a PBL based program. Far from it. The accreditation council in North America (LCME) basically imposes a minimum of PBLs in curriculums. Also, from experience and first hand knowledge, the McGill faculty actively tries to limit how much PBLs are offered to students. (Brawer (2006) An interactive learning forum: anatomy of a disaster, Medical Education 40 (11), 1126–1127. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2929.2006.02578.x) Finally, a successful PBL based program is the one in University of Montreal. Since 1993 they have used a PBL centered approach to teach its students. This faculty has finished first in Canada (out of 14) in the final year exams for 7 consecutive years(http://www.iforum.umontreal.ca/DesNouvellesDe/2006-2007/20061031_MedecineMeilleursFinissants.html)

In this repect I will a) Correct the spelling error of Canadada, b) Remove McGill from the list of schools that you cite, and c) boldly add university of montreal's name to that list —Preceding unsigned comment added by 132.204.232.24 (talk) 16:32, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok fair enough. Admittedly I only used one source, a 2004 article from the British Medical Journal: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/329/7457/92. 62.56.92.199 20:16, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

This doesn't even make any sense gramatically anymore. "Noteably, Universities that pioneered successful Problem-based-learning such as University of Montreal or McMaster, and while it had no involvement, the elitist of the Canadian Universities, University of Toronto in Canada are themselves prestigous institutions that hold worldwide reputations for clinical and academic excellence, taking the top few percent of worldwide graduate applicants." Why is "universities" capitalised when it is not part of an actual university name? As for adding more and more universities to this list, (probably by zealous students) get a grip and cite a source and leave a comment on this page if you want to add it. Otherwise leave it alone. I'm reversing this edit as it adds nothing to the article. 78.86.150.243 21:40, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Bad paragraph
I have cut some flab out of a paragraph, which now reads:
 * The MDAP system has come under much criticism within the medical student press (Student BMJ) and at medical student conferences such as the one held by the BMA in March 2006 where there was dissatisfaction with the way London students had been treated. It has also been suggested in letters to The Times that some medical students have lied on their MDAP forms.god hates blacks and jews y because there is no mention of what MDAP might be. At the moment is lacks precision. All it tells me is that some people in the system aren't happy. Well, that's usually true everywhere. The paragraph gives me no insight into the complaints, and no means to assess how serious the disagreements might be. It needs sharper phrasing, context, a mention of alternative points of view and context. Osomec 02:57, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Graduate Entry into UK Medical Schools
If a person has a 4-year bachelor's degree (e.g. pre-med) from a top U.S. university, can he or she apply for admission as a graduate student into an accelerated 4-year program in a British university ? Or does he/she have to apply to a regular 6-year undergraduate program like local UK students who have just taken their A-Level exams ? 200.177.17.248 01:48, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

What is the foundation programme actually about in medical terms?
The article currently says that the foundation years "focus on the seven principles of the MMC training ethos: trainee centred, competency assessed, service based, quality assured, flexible, coached, and structured & streamlined." Okay, that's the waffly management speak, but in terms of medicine what do they actually do? Hoylake 14:06, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

Length of MB/PhD program at Cambridge
As I understand it, the MB/PhD actually takes slightly less than 9 years to complete, as opposed to 8 years as indicated in the article. The breakdown of the program would be: 2 years of undergrad pre-clinical studies + one additional year of undergrad studies for the intercalated BA degree + approximately seven months corresponding to the first stage of the clinical course + three years of intercalated PhD research + two additional years of final clinical studies. Can anyone confirm that ? 200.177.10.221 17:07, 17 December 2006 (UTC)

MB/PhD versus MD in the UK
I know that the research degree of "Doctor of Medicine" (MD) ranks higher in the Oxbridge order of precedence than a standard PhD in a clinical subject. From an academic point of view however, which one is more difficult to get ?

The MD used to be viewed by doctors as a higher degree than a PhD and had greater prestige. That has changed however, with the PhD being regarded as the 'harder' degree to get, due to different supervisor requirements, greater time input, etc. That said, there are massive differences between universities as to the criteria for an MD or PhD. As with your MBBS and/or BSc, it really does depend which university you get your degree from. 62.56.70.254 06:20, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

As far as I understand it (and the way it works at the University of Leicester, at the very least), a PhD can be intercalated whilst at medical school (the usual progression being 2&frac12;yr preclinical course --> 1 yr BSc/MSc --> 1yr PhD --> 2&frac12;yr clinical course), whereas an MD is exclusively a post-MBChB/MBBS course. To me that would suggest that the MD would be considered a "higher level" degree than a PhD (although in my opinion managing to intercalate a PhD at med school is very impressive anyway). I'll try and ask one of my MBPhD friends for input. James Bedford 12:18, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Pre Clinical
The London colleges really can't be grouped into the Pre-clinical/clinical catagory of teaching. At Imperial, I know that it's definately not split to the extent that Oxbridge is, and I'm pretty sure that at UCL it isn't either. For example, at ICSM there are 2 years of pre-clinical, in terms of the lectures, once every couple of weeks patient contact, and PBL stuff. The 3rd year then has 28 weeks of firms in hospitals, and even the 2nd year has a 4 week clinical firm. Then the 4th year is for a BSc. Finally you have years 5 and 6 which are spent entirely on firms. This is vastly different to the Oxbridge courses, which are split quite evenly down the middle of the 6 years, rarely letting you near patients for the first 3. So I've gone ahead and deleted it! 62.56.70.254 06:20, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

The whole section on course types is not very NPOV and could do with a rewrite, perhaps compartmentalising the different types and maybe indicating which schools currently do which... James Bedford 12:24, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Course Types
The PBL discussion makes claims without backup from sources. The following may be useful (I don't have time to read them now): James Bedford 10:47, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
 * PDF: ABC of learning and teaching in medicine: Problem based learning
 * PDF: Reform of undergraduate medical teaching in the United Kingdom: a triumph of evangelism over common sense

Ok actually rewrote that whole section as it was messy before. Note that I think it is still very rough, but I scoured Medline for decent references to back it up, rather than just being a slanging match between PBL vs non PBL. Unfortunately as there isn't much reputable evidence (or indeed at all thats not from mouthy students) for PBL though, the pros for that are a little thin on the ground. It still needs work 62.56.95.93 23:42, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

Formals?
I'm a little puzzled about this:


 * Most UK medical students belong to medical societies, or groups set up within the university's students' union and run by and for medical students, typically organising social events (such as Balls/Formals... (Bold type added).

I assume this means formal halls. Is this true? I have never heard of a college holding a special formal hall for a particular subject group, though maybe this does go on in some colleges that I don't know about. A Schools dinner, to mark the completion of Schools, would be subject-specific, but it isn't really a formal hall.--Oxonian2006 (talk) 15:40, 11 May 2008 (UTC)


 * A 'Formal' is short for a formal occasion such as a meal or party where one might be expected to wear one's finest clothes and be on one's best behaviour. Scunner3rd (talk) 16:35, 31 January 2013 (UTC)

Course Length
The course length section contains an error - For Oxford/Cambridge/London, it is not 2/3 years preclinical, it is 2. Clinical school is 3 years. There is then 1 intercalated year (In fact this is a simplification - at Oxford there are 5 and a bit terms of preclinial - so under 2 years - then 3 and a half terms of the intercalated science degree). You can reference this from the oxford website. I attend Oxford medicine, and what is written at the moment is plain wrong, but I cannot edit it. 82.46.212.111 (talk) 22:31, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Final Year suggested to be FPO year 1
The immedeiate postgraduate section contains inaccurate information. The Foundation year is not completed in medical school. It is in fact completed postgraduation and in not the responsibility of the medical school, but a responsibility of the doctor. For this reason, a doctor from a london medical school may complete his foundation year in another part of the uk. The FPO appplication system is the process that leads to placement for the foundation year. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.149.252.180 (talk) 01:11, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

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