Reapplying To Medical School

You may be able to reapply to Medical School if you didn’t get the A-Level grades you were hoping for.

This guide outlines which universities allow re-applications, how you can improve your application, and how to reapply.

Jump to section:

• Which Medical Schools Can I Reapply To?
• How Can I Improve Before Reapplying to Medical School?
• How Do I Reapply to Medical School?

Not sure what your next steps should be? Book a General Advice session!

Which Medical Schools Can I Reapply To?

Most Medical Schools allow you to reapply to their Medicine programmes. The table below lists the policy for each one:

How Can I Improve Before Reapplying to Medical School?

Some universities, like St Andrews, UCL and Leicester, ask that they are shown new evidence of improvement in your application. This may be taking on some new work experience in a gap year, resitting your A-levels, or even working on your interview technique.

Our tips for improving your application include:

• Resit your A-levels. You don’t necessarily need to re-take the whole A-level at school – with some subjects you can re-take specific units. You could also choose to revise independently and sit the exam at your school in the summer. Speak to your teachers about which option is best for you, considering your grades – and check each  Medical School’s A-Level Resit Policies
• Ask for interview feedback. If you made it to the interview stage, you could ask the panel for your performance feedback. Some students find that they didn’t have enough work experience of good quality, or didn’t perform well at the interview. Getting feedback means you can focus on improving your interview technique. You could run through mock Medical School Interview Questions with a teacher or friend to help you familiarise yourself with an interview setting. You could also try our Online Mock Interview], Interview Tutoring or Interview Courses to improve your technique with admissions experts.
• Improve your work experience. Getting more work experience is a great way to make the most of your gap year, add more to your Personal Statement and to demonstrate your enthusiasm for Medicine to your school – and, importantly, to decide if studying Medicine is the right choice for you. While that’s tricky right now, there are some COVID-safe work experience alternatives and a virtual work experience opportunity from BSMS. Make sure you swot up on what work experience med schools want for 2021 entry.

How Do I Reapply to Medical School?

If you’ve applied to Medicine in a previous year, you’ll need to register with UCAS again – your username and password you had previously won’t work, so you’ll need to create a new account.

The rest of the process is the same: you have to upload a Personal Statement, your personal details and select the medical schools. When you’re making your selections, make sure you double-check which universities allow re-applications – you don’t want to waste an application space!

Don’t forget to update your Personal Statement with your new work experience and information on how you made the most of your gap year, and/or update your details with new predicted A-Level grades.

Learn More:

• Medical School Requirements
• GCSE Requirements for Medicine
• What A-Levels Do You Need to be a Doctor?
• A-Level Resit Policies
• Medical School Comparison Tool
• Medical School Rankings