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Become a pathologist

You can download this infographic as a jpeg and print it out.

RACGP Find out more on How to be a doctor General Practitioner

From high school

Check with the university or universities you are applying to about the entry requirements for high school graduates. This may involve:

Some universities offer a 5 or 6 year undergraduate medical degree.

Some universities offer a slightly different pathway for high school graduates. If you have provisional entry into medicine from high school, you will do a 2 year accelerated undergraduate degree (e.g. Biomedical Science) before entering medical school. In this pathway you will do a 4 year medical degree following on from your 2 year accelerated biomedical science / health science degree.

Graduate entry

Check with the university or universities you are applying to about the entry requirements for university graduates. This may involve:

  • GAMSAT – you may need to register for and sit the Graduate Medical School Admissions Test and achieve a high score (click here for Dr Gerry Considine’s tips for GAMSAT success)
  • GPA – your grade point average, that is, the average of your grades in your undergraduate university degree (the highest being 7) may be used as part of the entry criteria
  • Interview – an interview my also be used by the university as a way of selecting which students will gain entry into their medical school

In Australia the medical degree is generally 4 years when you are entering as a university graduate.

Medical Degree (4 to 6 years)

As you will have noted above, Medical degrees in Australia are between 4 and 6 years depending on whether you are coming into the degree as a university undergraduate or graduate.

Internship (1 year)

During this year a number of rotations are completed in different departments in a hospital.

Residency (1 or more years)

More rotations in a hospital. Some residents stay in this part of the medical training pathway for a number of years before they can gain entry into the vocational training program of their choice.

Vocational training (5 years)