Medicine MBChB at University of Dundee

Throughout your studies, you’ll be based at Ninewells Hospital, Dundee, which will give you access to clinical areas from day one and develop your understanding of how modern healthcare operates.

With around 160 students in each academic year, the size and structure of our medical school helps you get to know your peers and the academics and clinicians teaching you. You'll feel part of our community from the start - especially as you'll be interacting with real patients from early in the course.

The curriculum starts with an eight-week foundation block which explores the fundamental science that underpins the field of medicine – this will help you start to think like a doctor and begin clinical problem-solving.

Our spiral curriculum helps you build on knowledge in relevant areas year-on-year – you won’t be expected to learn everything in one block and then remember it forever. We’ll revisit topics to help your knowledge become second nature.

For the first three years, you’ll learn about body systems, examining normal and abnormal function before exploring clinical cases. You'll also learn anatomy by dissection. We use Thiel-embalmed cadavers which retain life-like tissue quality. This experience is as close to examining the anatomy of a living person as possible, and will give you an experience and understanding that no other medical school in the UK can offer.

After your pre-clinical years, you’ll have the option to intercalate and gain a BMSc in a range of subjects, but whether you decide to do this or not, in Levels 4 and 5, you move into clinical training. This is a series of placements that will give you a well-rounded experience in a number of clinical areas, and enable you to put your training into practice at the point of care for real patients in real healthcare settings.

Career

Studying medicine is the first step to a career as a doctor. The medical profession is ever-changing, and working in the field can be hard work, but many doctors find their careers rewarding and fulfilling. There is almost a 100% employment rate for medicine graduates meaning that post-graduation, you should be able to find employment in the medical field.

From 2024 onwards, all UK medical graduates will have to pass both parts of the Medical Licensing Assessment (MLA) in order to receive a primary medical qualification from the General Medical Council. You will sit your MLA tests during the final years of your degree.

After you graduate, you'll go into a 2-year foundation programme and join the field as a junior doctor – you may be referred to as an FY1 (foundation year 1) or FY2 (foundation year 2) doctor during this time. These two years will see you move round different care environments within hospitals to gain experience of different medical specialities and undergo further clinical training.

After your FY1, you'll be able to gain full registration with the GMC, and after FY2, you'll be able to apply for further study and training in a medical specialism – for example, cardiology, gynaecology, or emergency medicine – or go into general practice as a general practitioner (GP).

Following your foundation years, you'll be able to choose how your career progresses. You might decide to become a GP where you'll see a range of patients with a variety of ailments, and make decisions on what the most effective course of treatment is, whether that's medication or referral to a specialist consultant. Training for this takes three years.

If you don't want to be a GP and are interested in a specific area of medicine, you can choose to become a specialist consultant. This will involve further training in a particular area of medicine which can take up to eight years to complete.

Whatever you choose to do with your medical degree, studying medicine opens the door for a wide range of potential roles both in and out of the medical field. If you choose this course, you'll graduate ready to meet the challenges of the role of a doctor, but the wide-ranging transferable skills you'll develop will also mean you can change careers if you decide medicine isn't for you.