Help! How to advise shortlisting for medical school

[Poppiesarelovely]

Can I please pick the brains of parents who’ve been there!
My DD is about to start lower 6th, so we are starting to look more seriously at the options for applications. We live in N Ireland, so travelling to all of DD’s possibilities is just not practical or financially possible.
She is a high achiever, who is being encouraged by school to consider Oxbridge. But my question is how best to narrow down her choices, especially if Oxbridge means having to do the BMAT.
Would it be wise to pick 2 BMAT and 2 UKCAT? How does a student know if they are better suited to one test or the other?
Additionally, whilst she always considered an Oxbridge application, she has mentioned more recently that she might find it difficult being ‘average’ as she has placed 1st in her year since starting high school!
Thanks

[bengalcat]

Most of my work experience students come leading in the GCSE year or the summer holidays after GCSE’s or autumn of the lower six so they can put it on their uni application form or discuss at interview if needed .

[242Mummy]

Ah! Sorry I mis-interpreted "things like this" in your post!

[Cleopatrai]

I wasn’t talking about work experience or volunteering ^. I’m simply saying being this concerned about whether to pick 2 UCAT unis or 3 or maybe even one and which universities at this stage is far too early.

[242Mummy]

To answer one of your questions poppies, don't worry about which universities to pick yet. Apply strategically based on your DD's results and selection criteria set out by the unis. If she already has a few unis that she likes, check their admissions policy to see if she has a chance of being called to interview. Take it from there.

DS1 hedged his bets by sitting both BMAT and UCAT.

[242Mummy]

Agree with SirTobyBelch. I found the post-GCSE period the perfect time for DS to find out a little more about a medical career, make decisions, sort out volunteering (most hospitals/hospices are willing to give 16-year-olds responsibilities and patient contact).

DS1 spent a lot of time in lower sixth on volunteering, work experience and work shadowing. And also worked a Saturday job in a local pharmacy. Upper sixth, so far, has been filled with continued volunteering activities, admissions tests, UCAS application. From November - February, we're hoping that he's going to have to prep for interviews! After that, it's all about the A-levels.

[SirTobyBelch]

@Cleopatrai - But voluntary/work experience, aptitude tests, etc., need to be done during lower sixth and the summer between lower & upper sixth. Even lower sixth is a little bit late to be deciding on preferred career routes, and anyone planning to apply for medicine needs to have clear plans in place early in lower sixth.

[Cleopatrai]

Honestly, lower sixth is too early to be deciding things like this. Especially as admissions change and your daughters strengthens change. E.g she may do poorly on the UCAT and need to do all BMAT, she may he amazing volunteering blah blah. Focus on alevels.

[juicyjuicymangoes]

Sorry to re start a thread that's a month old but I posted on here under a different username and only just logged back in to see other posts.

@titchy it is not correct that you cannot go to another university to intercalate. Most universities do permit you to but you need to go and ask the admissions team directly for their policy. I externally intercalated and half of the medics on the degree I studied did the same as me; they came from elsewhere. This was recent too. Student finance covered the year as normal and NHS bursaries kicked in as normal afterwards too.

External intercalation, while much rarer than staying at your university can offer an invaluable opportunity to students who want to study a niche subject only offered by a few universities. Law and ethics and Manchester and imaging at kings are two examples. Intercalate.co.uk has some useful info I think but I'm not sure if it's up to date.

Indeed, Loughborough's sports science degree can be taken by medics interested in sports medicine as an intercalated option.

[Pepermintea]

I think Southampton might also do the 5 year option with built in bmedsi like Southampton.

DD has just finished her 1st year at Cardiff and avoided any 6 year courses as "5 years is long enough". At the moment she still says she doesn't want to intercalate, but it wouldn't surprise me if she changes her mind. I think it's quite good that they don't need to know straight away and have time to find out what areas they are interested in.

[SirTobyBelch]

@Poppiesarelovely

Five- & six-year courses work like this:

St Andrews, Cambridge, Oxford: 3-year degree in medical science followed by 3-year degree in clinical medicine. In the case of St Andrews the second 3-year degree is taken at Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Manchester or Barts & The London (QMUL). I can't remember whether Dundee is an option.

Edinburgh, Imperial, UCL: 6-year programme with intercalated degree compulsory for everyone except those who already have a degree before starting (who therefore do 5 years). King's: as above but will allow students to opt out of intercalated degree.

Nottingham: 5-year course that includes a BMedSci, so intercalation not necessary to gain an additional degree.

Everywhere else: 5-year course with option to take an additional year to intercalate (subject to approval, which might depend on marks in previous years, interview, etc.). Some will allow intercalated bachelors' degrees after year 2 or 3 or masters' degrees after year 4.

The additional degree adds points to the student's education performance measure (EPM) in her/his foundation programme application system (FPAS) application for the first job after graduating. Nottingham's BMedSci only counts for half as much as a full intercalated degree; a master's counts for more than a bachelor's.

[Needmoresleep]

The five year courses are without intercalation. Some allow a sixth intercalation year.

Whether the 'majority' find it useful. Probably not. I think only one third of DDs cohort will chose (or be allowed) to intercalate. DDs best friend wants to be a GP and wants to get her training over and done with so has no interest in intercalation.

DD in contrast does not want to be a GP, is a natural mathematician who likes the idea of a year of academic study, which hopefully will give her head start in a fairly technical area of medicine.

I would not worry about the 'majority' but about the sort of path your DC is likely to want to take and which doors need to be kept open. This relates to initial choice of course as much as intercalation. Some courses, notably Oxbridge, but also some of the other 6 year courses, can be quite academic, as in you are more likely to write an essay in your early years than see a patient. For DD the mix of a very hands on course with the option of taking a year out for further study in an area that interests her is a good way to achieve a balance.

[Poppiesarelovely]

This is probably a daft question, but are the 5 year medical courses those without an intercalated year? Do the majority of students feel the extra year is beneficial/worthwhile?

[HostessTrolley]

That’s good to know, thank you x

Dd was quite enthusiastic about anatomy and developmental physiology when she was keen on Kings, as that was one of their options. We were talking last night about done of the (light, holiday lol) reading she’s been doing over the summer, and she said she’s finding some of the medical ethics issues interesting and might look at taking that forward as an intercalation option

[Needmoresleep]

Hostess, sounds like Bristol. Cynics might say they want the fees!

Being able to go to where the expertise is, is nice if you know what interests you. So friends of DD seem to want to study child development (a Bristol strength), women's health (some good courses in London) and so on.

One tip is to have a good look at the link giving options towards the start of the second year, and perhaps consider going to some open days that year. Not all have open days, but Barts and Imperial did, which we discovered slightly by chance, and which gave DD a really useful insight into what they were looking for (one course she was considering turns out to be hugely competitive, so she may not bother as it is not her first choice) and what she wanted to achieve. Open days were in January and application deadlines are often at the end of January, so it is worth doing them a year early.

[HostessTrolley]

I asked my d about intercalation at imperial - it’s her firmed course. Her impression is that you can intercalate elsewhere if the course you really want to do isn’t available internally, but in general students are encouraged to stay at imperial.

[sluj]

If your DD is considering Cambridge, have a good look at the course programme to make sure it has the right mix of patient contact and academic content for her. Its quite different to many med schools having very late patient contact so she would need to make sure she is ok with that.

[oneteen]

Its been a while ago since we looked around Imperial (My DD was considering Medicine but changed her mind) but I know their program allowed external students at other Med/Vet schools to do their intercalated 1yr BSc program - not much help but I am sure the information would be on the various Uni websites.

[Needmoresleep]

Titchy, it varies. Some dont allow intercalation at all. Some, I think Nottingham is an example, require you to stay at the same University. Others let you go elsewhere. The link I posted has a list of intercalations available to students from other medical schools.

Bristol, for example, lets you intercalate elsewhere as long as they do not offer the subject you want to study, and providing you are making reasonable progress in your course. I think about a third intercalate.

It was quite an important element in DDs choice of med school. Now fingers are crossed that she gets the course she wants

[SirTobyBelch]

Most medical schools will allow students to undertake an intercalated degree at a different institution, as long as they can get the other institution to take them. However, I don't think you can do this if you're on a six-year course including a compulsory "integrated" intercalated degree (UCL, Imperial, Edinburgh), just like you can't do the third year of a 3+3 medicine degree (St Andrews, Oxford, Cambridge) at a different institution.

[titchy]

Intercalate means you stay at the same university, just spending a year doing different modules so you can get a BSc degree along the way. You don't go elsewhere then come back.

[Bimkom]

How do you know if a medical school will or will not allow one to study elsewhere to intercalcate? Some websites seem to say that the degree is five years or six years if you intercalcate (which seems to mean that you can intercalcate at the university in question), but how do you know if you can go elsewhere after your third year and then come back? Are there places that won't let you defer a year if you wanted to intercalcate somewhere else? Or is it a matter of encouragement. If the degree appears to offer an intercalcation option, where do you find that they won't let you go elsewhere (maybe I am just missing it, but the discussion often seems to assume you are intercalcating at that university, understandably, but not sure I see the fine print).

[goodbyestranger]

Yes it does but then it doesn't set as much store on the BMAT as Oxford. Statistically, Cambridge is easier to get into than Oxford (18% success rate as opposed to 14.5%), so a good choice for those who prefer it anyway!

[Poppiesarelovely]

Can anyone tell me if Cambridge accepts the August BMAT? Of the two, it is probably her favourite.

[Needmoresleep]

Hah...there was a couple of years where DD did not need to do any shadowing as she saw plenty of the inside of hospitals as a patient. Weird, she had no sports injuries for a decade, then they all came at once. This one was particularly annoying as someone ran into her on an empty piste.

That said she was not so injured that she was not able to clock that a ski season in the Alps as a medic might be fun, and ask the girl a few questions. Probably great experience for someone wanting to specialise in trauma, so one reason to keep up French.

[goodbyestranger]

Blood wagon sounds very scary Needmoresleep.