Neuroscience to med

Hey, have you done the ucat? You wont be able to do clearing for medicine without doing it, its basically just the admissions test for medicine everyone has to do. It's taken from summer to September so you'd have to do it after a levels assuming you're sitting them at the moment. After the ucat you'd do interviews and receive offers this time next year. Your options are really, take a year out and reject the neuroscience offer or accept and reapply while at uni but that could be a waste of a year? Ideally you'd be allowed to defer a year but I don't think you can, you could still reapply for that same course again when applying for medicine as you are only allowed to apply for four medicine courses leaving one as backup, this gives you options if you don't get offers. As well as this you'd need work experience/ volunteering as it's essential for your personal statement and to talk about in interviews. I'm sure you've done great stuff for neuroscience (congrats on your offer as well) but being in a hospital/ healthcare setting is really valuable as well. I would recommend looking for that now because from my experience it's really hard to find and easiest to get in touch with friends and family or contacting the volunteering department of a hospital well in advance. Emailing different practices can work but as I say it's very competitive and best to be in touch asap. The best time to do that would be summer or September at the latest October as medicine has early entry so all application have to be in by October. It's a really long and stretched out process but if you really want to do this then one year is really not costing a lot! During the rest of the year I would say get a job or lots of volunteering potentially healthcare related as in interviews the question why have you taken a year out/ what have you been doing is bound to come up (also to keep you sane so you're not just at home ha). Then after that have an amazing time! Travel, see friends, meet new people, volunteer, experience new things. Although it sucks that eveyone else is at uni take it as an opportunity even a gift to yourself, no studying but time to prepare!! Enjoy it and whatever you do or whatever happens good luck!!

Hey yeah that's so scary, as you've done the ucat theres no harm in going through clearing if you're really serious about med, yes your ucat is below average but some med schools don't weight it as highly and at that point you'll have nothing to lose! I would say reapply because if you apply for neuroscience at Edinburgh again with achieved grades I don't see why you wouldn't get an offer again. Then if you don't get in through clearing you can really focus to get a better ucat with no distractions and lots of time, I think a lot of people put so much pressure on the ucat but there are lots of med schools that will give offers to lower scores. Definitely don't give up hope. You seem to be really considering this and you don't want to regret not doing something you're really passionate about!

Yay!!! That's so exciting! I would recommend having a meeting with your teachers and if theres a teacher that does the medicine/UCAS stuff at your school because i think clearing for med is a weird process and would be good to get some tips and support! Good luck!!