Access to Medicine - What to do? Please Help!

[xpto_s1]

Hello!

I came to London 1 year ago with my girlfriend to study. I was heading for pilot courses while she wanted to do Medicine.

Firstly we had information that all we had to do was to apply via UCAS and wait for the university's reply. Well it worked for me but unfortunately she's doing a Health and Sports Science at TVU (A course that she is actually enjoying but it's not her objective) as she was rejected to medicine courses, and now it happened again ( for starting in 2007). It's the second time she is rejected for a medicine course and she is really down and desmotivated. This last time she even done an UKCAT and BMAT test. Seriouslly i need someone to help us as i don't like to see her sad because of this. She has great grades so we don't understand what's wrong.

Basically what we know for sure is that she needs to apply via UCAS, do a BMAT, UKCAT and that she must attend an interview.

I really would like to find someone that is able to spend some minutes explaining everything since the very first step and how things should be made. I also would like to know what are the BMAT and UKCAT average scores or just an idea of what scores are needed to be selected.

Thanks for reading,

Goncalo

[Purrr]

Hi,

You sound like a very supportive boyfriend!

I'll PM you my replies to your questions later today if that's ok as it may be a bit long and I'm at work at the moment

Could I just ask you to PM me the following: country of which your girlfriend is a citizen, what sort of schooling she has had before coming to England (up to what age and what subjects), how much work experience/voluntary work she's done and what unis she's applied for in the past and her UKCAT/BMAT results. I'm not being nosy, but that information will help me tailor my answers more specifically to your girlfriend's situation

And as a doctor-in-training, confidentiality is assured *lol*

[xpto_s1]

Ok so:

She is from Portugal which makes part of the EU.
She is now 19 and makes 20 in November 2007
The schooling that she has is the standard in portugal which is the complete secondary school. In the British Council website it says that this is equivalent to A-Levels and in portugal or even here the next step would be studying in university.

As for the grades our certificates in portugal are scored with a mark from 0 to 20, and in the last 3 years of the secondary formation a student needs to choose a group (speciality). She have chossen the sciences group which is the group that most people choose if they want to follow health, medicine studies etc..

The certificate in Portugal is called: Diploma de Ensino Secundario
She went to portugal last year to make the final tests again in order to raise the grades a bit so the new certificate is dated 01-Jul-2007

Subject Diploma de Ensino Secundario-Portugal
Grade 18
Module details:
Date: 01/07/07 Title: Biology Grade: 19
Date: 01/07/07 Title: Chemestry Grade: 19
Date: 01/07/07 Title: Maths Grade: 18
Date: 01/06/05 Title: Lab Applications of Biology ll Grade: 17
Date: 01/06/06 Title: English Grade: 19
Date: 01/06/06 Title: Lab Applications of Biology lll Grade: 17
Date: 01/06/05 Title: Physics and Chemistry Grade: 18
Date: 01/06/05 Title: Lab applications of Chemistry ll Grade: 17
Date: 01/06/06 Title: Psychology Grade: 18
Date: 01/06/05 Title: Earth and Life Science Grade: 19
Date: 01/06/05 Title: Philosophy Grade: 18
Date: 01/06/05 Title: Portuguese B: 20

I don't know much about these medicines courses but i find her grades quite good for the job.

Now it comes the bad part.. She only worked here as a secretary/recepcionist and it was on part-time for a few months.

UKCAT, BMAT and IELTS:
-Now i think that she didn't gave her best on these ones as she was already starting to get desmotivated, but again.. i don't have an idea of the values required to be selected.

UKCAT:
Date Taken: 05-Out-07
----------------
UKCAT SUBTEST SCORES:
-Verbal Reasoning 370
-Quantitative Reasoning 410
-Abstract Reasoning 540
-Decision Analysis 320

--------------------------------

IELTS:
Date Taken: 11 Aug 2007
---------------
Listening 6.0
Reading 5.5
Writing 5.5
Speaking 7.0
-----------------------
Overall Band Score 6.0


As for the BMAT i can't find the paper, but i guess that with this information, it already gives more or less a picture of what it is.


As i said before she applied 2 times. I have here a paper from UCAS Dated 25-May-2007 saying the courses that she have chosen at that time. They were:

-SGEO (St. George) Course A101 REJECTED Entry Date 2007
-SGEO (St. George) Course A100 REJECTED Entry Date 2007
(these 2 were the medicine courses that she really wanted)
-LONMT(London Met) Course LL43 Waiting 2007
-LONMT Course LC46 Waiting 2007
-TVU Course L510 Waiting 2007
-TVU Course B990 Confirmed 2007

(She had no choice than to accept the health course at TVU which was the closest that she had to medicine.. still it's not what she wanted)


Now i got here other one like this dated 17-DEC-07
This one only got 4 courses selected. They were:

IMP (Imperial College?) A100 entry 01-OCT-08
SGEO (St. George) A100 ''
QMUL (Queen Mary's i guess) A100 entry 01-SEP-08
KCL (King's College) A100 ''

I saw in the bottom of your message UCL Medic 2007.. if you are there congratulations! that one is very nice! she talks a lot about that one and kings college as well.

Sorry, i know that this is with some mistakes but i only slept 3 hrs this night..

So in my point of view, she has to get better results on UKCAT, IELTS.. am i right? because that is quite easy if someone get fully prepared for it. I am impressed with myself as i was a student which didn't like to study and never opened a book to study in portugal and i was the worst at maths and the other subjects as well. And here i'm doing one thing that i've never imagined to be doing flying aeroplanes.. and the theory tests is all around 90%s. If one person wants it pretty badlly, it will get it i guess.

Ok so tell me something when you can.. and by the way i have to thank you for replying and for your will to help me and my girlfriend. She needs this to be super happy!

THANKS!!!!!!!!!



Goncalo

[Jacqua]

Hi


you really are a very supportive boyfriend!


She may need to take the UKCAT again or she could do the bradford clinical sciences foundation degree if u dont mind moving to bradford where on passing the foundation year with 70% you progress to the first yaer of medical school at Leeds. Though for that you need 220 UCAS points I think, though her grades do look really good so they may accept it but if you look on the website it may be able to tell you more http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/clinsci/, maybe she could phone them as well. There are other foundation degrees I think you could do one at brighton and sussex medical school. Oh and she can prepare for the UKCAT using a medicas website it has hundreds of UKCAT questions

I hope that was a little help


Well done purr UCL is such a good medical school!

jacqua

[xpto_s1]

Yeah Thanks Jacqua!

I will check these foundation courses right now. I already found one at St. George but the minimum age is something like 21yrs old. she's 19. And they talk about GCSE's while she's got equivalency to A-Levels according with the british council website.

As for the UKCAT i will check out that website and i already got programs like "brain trainer" to improve numerical, verbal, spatial and logical reasoning. I also will put her doing pilot aptitude tests, these include coordination, hand-eye cordination, severe maths, concentration etc..

For the BMAT she got a small book that is in 2 shades of blue.. i don't know the name of the book, let me just check it out on amazon..
Is this one: Preparing for the BMAT: The Official Guide to the BioMedical Admissions Test

However i think that the book is great in explaining and illustrations but i think that she must get something of the same quality.. but bigger as this only has a few pages.

I now look at these posts, it looks that who wants medicine it's me.. I understand a few things but medicine medicine it's not for me.


Thanks!





Goncalo

[Jacqua]

Nope you just really want to help your girlfriend i'm a bit like that but with my brother haha

Hold on if your in London you could check out borders they should have books on the BMAT, have you shown your girlfriend this site

Good luck


jacqua