The UCL Medicine course

UCL's course is integrated. Rather than separate courses in physiology, biochemistry or anatomy, the science is organised around the body's systems, and each module brings in the sciences it needs. The whole year group takes the modules one after another, so everyone studies the same system at the same time.

Two strands run through the whole MBBS under the name The UCL Future Doctor. Applied Clinical Sciences covers anatomy and imaging, pathology, pharmacology, genetics, cancer, psychiatry, population health and artificial intelligence (AI) in health. Clinical and Professional Practice covers communication, clinical skills, ethics and law, patient safety and professionalism. Both are spiral: topics return each year at a more clinical level.

As the course goes on, learning moves from the lecture theatre to the workplace. From Year 4 you learn mainly on placement, alongside doctors, other health professionals and patients. CPP small groups move to Wednesday mornings in Year 4, so you can spend full days on placement.

UCL plans the course around a 40-hour week. In Years 1 and 2 about 20 to 30 hours are timetabled teaching, depending on the module, and the rest is independent study. At least ten hours a week are expected on top. Most sessions run between 9am and 5pm, and outside exam terms teaching finishes at lunchtime on Wednesdays.

All MBBS teaching is compulsory, with a 100% attendance requirement, because the degree leads to a regulated profession. In Years 4 to 6 you are at your placement from 9am to 5pm on most weekdays and 9am to 1pm on Wednesdays. Some placements include earlier starts, nights, weekends or on-call shifts.

The clinical years are longer: Years 1 to 3 last 30 weeks each, Years 4 and 5 last 45 weeks and Year 6 lasts 40. Over the six years that adds up to about 7,600 hours of training, including 104 weeks on placement, plus 1,200 hours for the iBSc.

Anatomy and imaging sit in the Applied Clinical Sciences strand and return through the course, but they are largest in the early years. UCL's 2026-entry course page describes a mix of dissection, which means cutting into donated bodies to expose the structures inside, prosection, where you study specimens experts have already dissected, and computer simulation. The 2027-entry page names dissection with computer-assisted learning and simulation.

Teaching happens in the Anatomy Laboratory in the Rockefeller Building in Bloomsbury. The main room is open-plan, with space for up to 40 donor tables and 180 students, and a smaller room takes small groups and holds anatomical models. You need your own white lab coat and safety goggles.

The teaching depends on people who donate their bodies after death, and each year students and staff attend a service of thanksgiving for them. If you enjoy the subject, a Clinical Anatomy dissection student selected component (SSC), a short block on a topic you choose, gives you more lab time.

Patient contact starts in Year 1. Under the new curriculum every module in Years 1 and 2 has its own Patient Journey, with clinical contact tied to the system you are studying.

In 2026/27 each student in Years 1 and 2 had one half-day visit to a GP practice, in a group of four to six. It was built around a 30 to 45 minute interview with a patient about living with illness. The new curriculum increases time in primary care, meaning general practice and community services.

The 2026/27 timetable also ends Year 1 with a compulsory half-day shadowing a Foundation doctor, a newly qualified doctor in the first two years of work. By the Year 6 GP assistantship you lead at least ten consultations of your own under supervision.

Your end-of-year exams are summative, meaning they decide whether you progress. In the new module list the Year 1 skills assessment is a portfolio, and Year 2 adds your first OSCE. Years 4, 5 and 6 each have an AKT plus a CPSA, made up of an OSCE and a portfolio.

Written papers are online and computer-marked, with no negative marking, using single best answer questions where you pick the best of five options. Years 2, 4 and 5 each sat 200 questions across two papers in 2026/27. OSCEs had eight to 12 stations of 12 minutes, and you must pass 55% of them.

You must pass every component within the same academic year, because you cannot carry a fail. Resits for Years 1, 2, 4 and 5 fall in the late summer, and in Years 4 to 6 you may instead repeat the whole year. You must qualify within nine years of starting.

Your Year 6 finals are the MLA. The AKT is a national written paper of 200 questions mapped to the GMC's content map. The CPSA is 12 stations covering examination, focused history, disease management, clinical skills and professional skills such as ethics. The GMC confirmed in April 2024 that it meets its requirements.

Alongside exams you keep a portfolio every year. In the clinical years it holds workplace-based assessments: the mini clinical evaluation exercise (mini-CEX), where a doctor watches you with a patient; the case-based discussion; and direct observation of procedural skills (DOPS). The portfolio is a graded part of the CPSA in Years 4, 5 and 6.

• You must also complete all portfolio and coursework requirements to move up a year and to be awarded the degree.
• Falling behind on one module normally brings a learning agreement, a written plan for catching up. Failing to keep to it, or falling behind again, can stop you entering exams.
• The MBBS is pass or fail. The top 10% of each year group earn a Distinction in Medical Sciences (Years 1 and 2), Clinical Science (Years 4 and 5) or Clinical Practice (Year 6), shown on the degree certificate.
• A Certificate of Merit goes to the next 10%: the top 20% by exam score in Years 1, 2, 4 and 5, and the second tenth in Year 6. It appears on the Medical School transcript, not the degree certificate.
• Both awards need first-attempt passes in every contributing exam and all in-course and portfolio work finished before you enter the exams.
• The PSA is a pass or fail test of prescribing skills, run jointly by the British Pharmacological Society and MSC Assessment, part of the Medical Schools Council. UCL scheduled it for late January of Year 6 in 2026/27.

Years 4 to 6 run across NHS hospitals, GP practices and community services in and around London. The core teaching sites are UCL's three campuses at University College Hospital, the Royal Free and the Whittington, and UCL lists the Barnet and North Middlesex trusts as central clinical sites too.

In Years 4, 5 and 6 you submit preferences for your placement sites. Modules A and B in Year 4 cover specialties taught at any of the central sites, while Module C includes specialties taught only at particular hospitals. The new structure keeps you at one site for longer.

The Year 6 hospital assistantship is based at a district general hospital. As well as Barnet and North Middlesex, UCL's partners are Watford General, Lister Hospital in Stevenage, Luton and Dunstable University Hospital and Basildon University Hospital.

You pay your own travel between the three campuses and to most placements. The primary care department helps with travel to certain GP practices, and from Year 5 students who receive an NHS Bursary can reclaim some travel and accommodation costs.

Two notes below come from the school's summary of placement returns for 2023/24, so they may have changed by the time you get there.

Student selected components are the parts of the course where you choose what to study. You take one after the exams in each of Years 1 and 2, with options including taught medical topics, humanities and social sciences. Year 5 ends with a two-week clinical SSC.

The elective is an eight-week block after finals in Year 6, in the UK or abroad. At least six weeks must be an on-site placement supervised by a senior doctor, and up to two weeks can go on travel and writing your report. You can split it into two placements of at least three weeks each. Both must be at the same institution or in the same country, though one placement overseas plus one in the UK is allowed.

Hands-on clinical work is the usual choice, but you can pick a non-patient-facing specialty such as radiology or histopathology. Clinically relevant research, public health placements including World Health Organization internships, medical education and healthcare management are also accepted. Laboratory-only research is not.

Your elective block is allocated in the first term of Year 5, when a four-stage approval process begins. UCL assesses each destination for clinical and personal safety, and will not approve a placement where the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) advises against travel.

The iBSc is compulsory unless you already hold a UK undergraduate degree. It is a full honours degree of 120 credits, and its classification comes from the iBSc year alone, so marks from Years 1 and 2 do not count. UCL says about 90% of iBSc students gain a first or upper second.

You choose during Year 2. After an online fair in the autumn you rank five programmes and write personal statements for your top two. Where a programme is oversubscribed, the leads select using anonymised personal statements, and you cannot switch once places are confirmed.

The MBPhD adds three years of full-time research between Years 4 and 5, with clinical teaching to keep your skills current. You apply during your iBSc year and need a first or upper second and a first-attempt pass in Year 4.

• Brain Sciences: Clinical Neurology and Brain Sciences; Psychology.
• Life Sciences: Anatomy, Cell and Developmental Biology; Neuroscience. Engineering Sciences: Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering.
• Mathematical and Physical Sciences: History and Philosophy of Science and Medicine; Sociology and Politics of Medicine.
• Medical Sciences: Clinical Sciences; Immunology, Infection and Cell Pathology; Maths, Computers and Medicine; Oncology; Sports and Exercise Medical Sciences; Surgical Sciences.
• Population Health Sciences: Cardiovascular Science; Global Health; Paediatrics and Child Health; Primary Care Research and Clinical Practice; Women's Health. Social and Historical Sciences: Medical Anthropology.

In Bloomsbury the Medical School's offices are at 74 Huntley Street and in the Rockefeller Building, which also houses the Anatomy Laboratory. The Cruciform Hub, below the Cruciform Building, combines a medical library with quiet study space, group work areas and computer clusters.

The Royal Free campus shares a building with the hospital and has lecture theatres, seminar rooms, a Clinical Skills Centre, a medical library and a student hub. At the Whittington, the Undergraduate Centre on level 3 of the Highgate Wing has study space and seminar rooms.

The clinical skills centres are where you train in basic and paediatric life support and in infection control. Before finals you sit a mock OSCE and can attend practice sessions in the skills centres, working through sample stations with classmates. Outside teaching hours and at weekends you can also ask to book a room there for revision sessions organised by the medical students' society.

Every student is given an iPad, which you use to record portfolio feedback on placement.

Every medical student has a personal academic tutor, a member of staff who meets you each term and can write references for you later. Their details are in the Academic Student Record, the school's online record system, and each year has an academic year lead as well.

Two specialist teams back that up. The Programme and Progression Support Team advises on course rules, health problems affecting your studies, taking time out, elective planning and fitness to practise. The Student Support and Personal Tutoring team offers pastoral care, study skills, careers and money advice.

On placement every site gives you a named educational supervisor. Anything that worries you can be reported through UCL's Report and Support system, and placement concerns go to the school's Quality Assurance and Enhancement Unit. In your first term you also meet weekly with a Transition Mentor, a student from a later year.