Medicine with a Foundation Year

This course is only open to students who are living in the UK and have UK home status, indefinite leave to remain or refugee status (with a letter from the home office as evidence) at the time you make your application.

You must also meet the following criteria:

The university's contextual admissions criteria - this means you will not receive a further reduced offer from the required A levels of BBC, or equivalent, as stated in the entrance requirements. The contextual offer has already been applied to the grade reductions and entrance requirements.
You do not meet the standard or contextual entry requirement grades for our five-year medicine course.
Have not previously studied at a university.

You cannot apply for this course and the five-year (A100) Medicine BMBS course.

You should apply for Medicine BMBS (A100) course if you:

meet the entry requirements for the five-year course
achieve ABB at A level, and choose to resit one or both of your B grades and then achieve all standard or contextual entry requirement grades for our five-year course

Admission tests

Criminal records declaration (DBS/Disclosure Scotland)

We must be confident in your conduct, health and ability to be professional and interact safely with patients. As part of your application you will be required to have an occupational health assessment and a disclosure and barring service (DBS) check. This will take place after an offer we have made has been accepted by you.

Health checks

We must be confident in your conduct, health and ability to be professional and interact safely with patients. As part of your application you will be required to have an occupational health assessment and a disclosure and barring service (DBS) check. This usually takes place around May or June for offer holders. We are able to accept pre-existing DBS checks as long as they meet the enhanced criteria check and are registered on the Update Service. If we have any serious concerns we will not offer you a place, and reserve the right to revoke offers should serious concerns arise before starting the course.

Interview

You will be required to have an interview. This usually takes the form of Multiple Mini Interviews (MMI). For 2024 entry, interviews will be completed online using Microsoft Teams. Interviews are offered to candidates based on scores as calculated by our selection process. The percentage threshold varies from year to year based on the number of applicants. If you meet the entry requirements for the course and have completed the Nottingham Pathways to Medicine Programme, Lincoln Summer School, the Nottingham Potential Summer School or the Nottingham Sutton Trust Summer School, you will be considered for the interview stage without having to go through the UCAT/GCSE scoring stage of our selection process. The fast track to interview is also available for elite athletes if the minimum entry requirements are met. If you are eligible for the fast track to interview you will still need to sit the UCAT and achieve Band 1 to 3 on the Situational Judgement Test. You will also need to meet the contextual requirements of the course.

Other

Work Experience: Applicants are usually expected to complete regular work experience when applying for medicine. This can be: Volunteering in a care related setting Volunteering with disadvantaged groups Paid employment in a job working with the general public Please note, we are not expecting any work experience to have taken place or be ongoing after March 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic. Your application for 2024 entry will not be negatively affected if you’ve been unable to complete any work experience you had planned. We will however be looking for knowledge of the profession and an understanding of the scope of the role and we may ask about this during your interview. If possible we'd advise that you speak to someone working in the NHS to ensure you are making an informed choice about your career in medicine. We expect you to demonstrate a commitment to caring for people and a realistic idea of what working as a doctor entails. Any students considering a gap year should use their time constructively either by working or further preparing yourself for a future career in medicine. Deferral requests: Requests to defer must be received by 1st May in order to be considered. Deferral requests are considered on a case-by-case basis.

University Clinical Aptitude Test (UCAT)

All applicants must take the UCAT (University Clinical Aptitude Test) in the same year you are applying. We do not accept the BioMedical Admissions Test (BMAT) for this course. Applicants who achieve a Band 4 in the Situational Judgement Test in the UCAT will not be considered. For more information, please refer to the UCAT website www.ucat.ac.uk

We consider applicants solely on the basis of their merits, abilities and potential – we use exam grades to prioritise applicants but look at a range of factors and aim to give everyone an equal opportunity to show their achievements.

We understand that background and personal circumstances can have an impact on academic performance at school or college. Applicants who are eligible under our contextual admissions policies may be considered for a reduced contextual offer.