Seeking advice on what to do: Westminster biomed now, or A2HE and KCL later

Hi, trainee Biomedical Scientist here in Clinical Biochemistry.
Yes, if you want to work in a diagnostic lab, your degree HAS TO BE IBMS accredited. If not, you will have to return to uni to do top up modules (your employer can pay this but it is down to them and you will likely be contracted to them for years, as I know someone at work doing).
If you wish to go to KCL, it is not IBMS accredited. Meaning you will not be able to go work as a Biomedical Scientist as being a BMS is a protected title by law. Meaning just having a BMS degree does not make you a BMS, you have to undergo the IBMS portfolio, obtain IBMS registration and then apply for the HCPC registration.
Truth be told, I don’t know what degrees you can go into right now off the top of my head with a BMS degree which is unaccredited minus teaching, but still.
If you have any questions about the degree, job or anything else, please feel free to respond.

Thank you so much for your response. Essentially I need to decide if I want to work in the NHS before I start my degree, but I feel it's hard to know without experiencing myself.
How is it working as an NHS BMS? Is there much progression? Is the job repetitive or is there variety? How's the working environment?

Working in the NHS can be repetitive but it does not always mean it will be. My lab effectively has five different sections, six if you include the people running the track system which feeds the analysers samples rather than being hand fed.
Chemistry analysers - ensuring the analysers are running constantly by ensuring before they are run, they have enough reagents split between them (some tests, we get 2k or more samples per day, others, 3 or 4). One example is effectively we get thousands of tests for calcium, however, methotrexate, maybe only 2-3 per week and even then that’s a lot. The job on here is to ensure that the system is constantly going, otherwise your service grinds to a halt and topped up every six or so hours as some tests are less stable than others, meaning they need to be kept an eye on more throughout the day. Typically this requires two BMS staff throughout the day to keep it going.
Immunoassays - These tests are more stable, but by no means less important. These tests can be your troponin samples (heart attack), Ferratin, sex hormones etc… this requires one BMS full time to keep it going, however, with these, once they’re up, they’re up for the day.
The above may be required to do dilutions where the results on the samples cap out (literally the analyser can’t count any higher), meaning they may have to do a 2, 5 or even a 20x dilution to get an idea of where the patient is. One example is when I was working a couple months back, I saw an analyser cap out on troponin, meaning the result had to be diluted to get an idea of just how bad this heart attack was for the patient.
Authorisation and Validation - This is where a BMS will sit at a PC and then make and receive calls based on the results they observe such as anything important that can’t wait such as overdoses on things like paracetamol. Don’t get me wrong, the two above posts also do this but it is more of a core role for this position. - One BMS is placed on this role.
Miscellaneous- This is a role whereby this can be done by a BMS or an Associate Practitioner (does not have to be IBMS accredited). It does not however mean where the individual is not IBMS accredited (or they may be but not employed as a BMS) it is any less important. I was on this role a few weeks back and was going through samples when we had a software failure, long story short, sample storage lost its brain and just stopped working, so we had to do a hard reboot. This resulted in us having to determine which samples were suitable for analysis or not as the fridge had gone past its temperature thresholds (fridge should be 2-8 degrees Celsius). Meaning it was up to myself whereby going through samples with low turnaround times such as troponin (8 hours at room temperature (off the top of my head, I may be wrong on this, but that’s what the book is for for sample stability), PSA (prostate specific antigen had a turnaround time of 3 hours outside of this, again off the top of my head, could be wrong and I don’t have the book on me as I type this) etc… so yes you do have to make judgement calls at times.
In the end, where the fridge was out of temperature for only a couple of hours and by only a single degree Celsius, my shift lead’s boss (my boss’s boss) said to just run it as normal.
Track - The track is run by a series of people, typically four. This is where they keep the machine moving which gets the samples to the machine as well as monitoring our sample storage and what’s available on the track. If the track is too full, we will keep it at around 80% capacity, just incase any urgent samples come through we need to load on.
A BMS is expected to do all of the above, as well as sample reception roles (taking calls, accepting samples and booking in samples, as well as making any calls on samples to reject as it may have not come through appropriately such as a chromogranin sample. There have been times where we have had to reject samples which have not come through on ice as the sample would have degraded too much to be reliable to analyse for appropriate treatment by a doctor.
There are other sections in chemistry, however, these may be more specialised as we have a specialist investigations unit for things such as therapeutic drug monitoring for organ transplants, which requires a more manual approach as opposed to putting the sample on the analyser.
So being a BMS can be repetitive or it can be quite varied, it depends one where you wish to go. 🙂
With regards to progression, you can go into different departments if you wish, or can become a specialist BMS (would require the specialist portfolio in a specific department) or can go into the clinical scientist route which would require you to apply for the NHS STP route. There are many roles you can do in the NHS.
I quite like the working environment where I am. I would say 99% of the time, you’ll find loads of great people to work with and will support you but don’t let the remaining 1% ruin it for you.
The environment with regards to how busy it is can also vary, however, I would say most of the time, you are kept mostly busy.
You can actually request lab tours if you so wish if you want to know what happens, however, just remember to look with your eyes and not your hands. 🙂
It may help you in making a decision. Any further questions, please feel free and I will respond as best as I can. 🙂

Who says Westminster isn't a good university? I went there and found the lecturers to be dedicated and supportive. I also went to UCL and found my lecturers didn't care about their students. Make a decision for what benefits you and don't just listen to people complaining on the Internet. Go and visits these universities and see for yourself.
The other way is to work backwards. Look at the job you want and see which degree is needed for it. If you want to work in the NHS then IBMS accreditation is the most important thing. Or you might spend several years and £10k converting.
If your forever dream is to go into research at a KCL run institute then trying to get into KCL would make more sense.
But I will also say, you have an offer from Westminster. An HE access certificate doesn't guarantee that KCL will make you an offer.

Thank you for such a detailed response! Genuinely so helpful to me ☺️
Are you working in an immunology lab? I'm interested into working in microbiology, how does the path to working in different specialities work?
Also it would be super useful to have a lab tour as you say, how do I go about requesting one? Do I email the lab directly?

Ah I see that's good to hear, I'm going to an open day at Westminster on Saturday so I hope it'll be reassuring. Perhaps i'm worrying too much when I see others online telling me to avoid it, I just fear i'll spend my 20s somewhere i'm unhappy.

I don't work in immunology I am afraid, despite us being directly attached to the immunology department and sharing the same lab effectively as haematology. So I'm afraid I can't really speak too much on micro or immunology as I've never worked in the field myself.
With regards to the specialties you can work in, I will say if you can, try and become as multi-disciplined as possible as it will give you far more give with regards to jobs you can apply for. I will say I just never found immunology nor micro that inteesting myself, nor any other science minus biochemistry. I keep meaning to try and go down the haematology route at some point as I do want to diversify my experience but right now, the two fields I've worked in are the following;
Virology/Molecular Testing (I began my lab career in the COVID diagnostic labs - those labs you sent your COVID swabs to to be analysed as a Medical Lab Assistant before being promoted to an Associate Practitioner after about 3 months, I kept this job for three years (excluding a 2 month unemployment gap because of Boris Johnson closing them and then ours was re-opened for a couple of years but on a much smaller scale (about 10% of staff were brought back and I was one of the lucky few) as a just in case measure)). We also started diagnosing flu and RSV later on.
After this, I went back to get my Masters as I noticed everyone who got promoted had a Masters and figured it would be the only way to get noticed in interviews or job applications (this isn't the case but I thought it would be beneficial to myself later down the line). I graduated this in November 2024 (took a solid month break between graduation and Jan to have Christmas off).
I had 8 interviews between Jan and March 2025 for different fields (microbiology, virology and clinical chemistry with different fields being a medical laboratory assistant to a trainee BMS) and literallly went up and down the country (most extreme points were Hull and the Isle of Wight). Admittadly this was to get the portfolio done with my last and most successful one being the trainee post I am in now. I even offered my services for free in exchange for the portfolio being given but heard absolutely nothing or was simply told they can't accept volunteers in the lab.
So, you can diversify if you want to (and would suggest doing so if you are capable as it opens up which fields you can apply to succesfully), however, it depends how well you perform in interviews as to whether you get the job or not. Fair warning though, once you graduate, particularly in the South East, unless you go to some VERY large hospitals (two I went to being Great Ormond Street and St. Barts who said I could do my portfolio there as soon as I began if successful) as when I asked some of the standard hospitals I applied to, I was told there would be a 2-3 year wait to begin my portfolio, followed by a 12-18 month period between beginning it and completing it.
I will be honest though, pathology can be a really difficult field to get a foothold into just because there are tonnes of people out there who are doing the degree (BMS) compared to the positions available. It's not impossible but can be difficult, I am having to now tell my best mate to keep trying for posts because he's been employed as a Band 2 Medical Laboratory Assistant now for 6 years despite being a registered BMS as of the last 6 months or so. Truth be told he isn't the best in interviews from what he's told me
Lab Tour:
With regards to getting a lab tour, I would suggest going onto the NHS jobs site and looking for any roles going in any hospitals you are willing to travel to in a lab environment (look under healthcare science). There will be some contact info in the job ad (a name, an email address and a phone number). I would suggest emailing as you are more likely to get a more direct response as opposed to a call which may get brushed under the rug. Ask if you can have a lab tour (with an explanation saying you're interested in the field and would be keen to learn more, you can also use this info for any potential future interviews) as I've noticed a couple of times people being shown around our lab in the last couple of months You'll be asked to wear standard protective gear (typically a lab coat) and not to wear anything which exposes bare skin (so no shorts and shoes to cover your feet i.e. no sandals). Feel free to ask any questions you have to the staff working to learn about the lab or the methods behind how the science works.
Good luck and sorry for the waffling, yes I have a bad habbit of that! XD

I hope the portfolio is going well!

I actually have a lab tour date booked as of today, so I am looking forward to that but also terrified! 😱

Deep breaths! They aren't out to get you. Remember all the important things, making sure you get them to sign in and wear a lab coat.
Then it's just your day job. You will be fine!

It isn’t in person, it’s online so I don’t think I need to worry about that part.
The date is the 10th March. 🙂
I’ve been told it’s effectively mostly H&S but we’ll have to wait and see, still need to make my PowerPoint yet!

Then you can make notes! I would still take a photo of the sink and labcoats and a (blank!) sign in sheet to say what is good practise for face to face.
Good luck 👍

Thanks!
Mind if I ask a question why the sink specifically (sorry if a daft question)? We have two sinks in the lab, one for hand washing with the eye wash station above it (and disposal of ice) and one for reagent disposal but minus that, I can't think of a reason why the photo of the sink would be necessary?