A-levels medicine

Hey! I'm an 11th grade student in a british school in Spain. My dream is to become a doctor and I plan on applying to Cambridge, UCL and Imperial. I don't know what A-levels to take... I was thinking of taking Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Maths A levels and French As level. Is it too much? What choice would be better? Is french a good contrasting subject? Help pleeeeease and thanks very much in advance p

The necessities for medicine are chemistry and ideally biology, so yes, them two. The other subject is often appreciated as physics or maths, but I don't think it matters too much as long as it's more of a traditional subject.

Imo 4 at AS (4th could be whatever you want) and 3 A2 is enough, and any more is not really worth it. It is regarded by RG Uni's that high UMS over 3 subjects > lower UMS over 4 and as medicine is a very competitive subject you want the best grades you can possibly get.

Thanks very much for your answer! I read that medical students at cambridge often have more than 3 science A levels and at UCL they like to see a contrasting subject. Does an As level science count as a fourth science?

I'm not entirely sure about Oxbridge, sorry. However generally AS sometimes counts as fourth; some uni's for example only require biology to AS, whereas some want it at A2. Your best bet would be to check the websites of the uni's your interested in, see the requirements, accepted subjects, etc.

http://www.russellgroup.org/InformedChoices-latest.pdf this may help too

Very useful! Thanks again

Thanks very much for your answer! I read that medical students at cambridge often have more than 3 science A levels and at UCL they like to see a contrasting subject. Does an As level science count as a fourth science?

Thanks very much for your answer! I read that medical students at cambridge often have more than 3 science A levels and at UCL they like to see a contrasting subject. Does an As level science count as a fourth science?

In terms of university application, "science" includes the three sciences as well as maths and further maths - but NOT psychology
So if you have the three sciences and maths, you have four sciences.


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Actually, I spoke to the medicine admissions officer from Oxford in person 3/4 months ago and as I took psychology, maths, chemistry and biology I worried about this. I was told that psychology is a science and this is the most common subject combination taken by medicine applicants there.


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It is for medicine then

The courses I look at for myself are physics chemistry etc so yeah

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I would HIGHLY, HIGHLY advise Biology, Chemistry and Maths. The other one doesn't matter too much.

Cambridge requires 3 sciences or 2 sciences and maths; some cambridge applicants have all 4, but it's not necessary.
It's true that UCL like to see a non-science subject.
You must do chemistry, and preferably also biology. For Cambridge you would also need to do either physics or maths.
Only do them all if you are sure you can handle the workload; it is far better to have AAA than AABB because you have overstretched yourself - any less than 3 As pretty much ends your chances of getting into undergraduate medicine. You might be ok with 5 at AS, and you can certainly start and see how you get on; then drop to 3 or 4 at A2

Yes that's what I'll probably do But will doing physics too increase my chances? Thanks for your help!

Yes that's what I'll probably do But will doing physics too increase my chances? Thanks for your help!

Thanks very much for this! But is french a good contrasting subject?