UK and Irish medical graduates
You can apply for registration through this pathway if you have a primary medical degree from the UK or Ireland and have completed your internship within the UK or Ireland.
Prerequisites
You can apply for registration through this pathway if you:
- have a primary medical degree from a university medical school in the UK or Ireland,
- have completed your internship in the UK or Ireland, and
- meet our "fitness for registration" requirements
You must also provide evidence of a job offer that includes supervision. We cannot consider your application if you do not have supervised employment.
Completed internship outside of UK and Ireland
If you completed your first postgraduate year outside the UK or Ireland, your application will be assessed using our recognition of internships policy. If this applies to you, contact us to find out about the additional information you need to provide.
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Any doctor applying for registration in New Zealand must be fit for registration and fit to practise medicine. It's a legal requirement on us to ensure they are. We determine this as part of our assessment of your application for registration.
Applying for registration
To apply for provisional general registration, you and your employer need to work together to complete your application using the REG1 application form and Checklist 2.
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Checklist 2: United Kingdom and Irish medical graduates - Part A: Checklist for registration in New Zealand
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Application for registration in New Zealand
Primary source verification of documents
Please don't send us your application documents until you have sent the required documents for primary source verification through the EPIC system. The verification process can take time and we cannot process your application until we have received the verification at source.
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Doctors who hold overseas qualifications and who want to apply for registration in New Zealand must have key documents verified from their primary source.
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Special instructions and FAQs for applicants to the Medical Council of New Zealand
The registration interview
We will consider your application once it is complete and we have received primary source verification of your documents. We will then let you know the outcome of your application.
If your application is successful, we will send you an 'eligibility for registration' letter. This confirms for other agencies like Immigration New Zealand that you are able to be registered and will give you the details for your registration interview. For more information on the registration interview, please see the link below.
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All international medical graduates coming to New Zealand to practise medicine for the first time must attend a registration interview and be able to produce the information we've asked for.
Working under supervision and variations
Once we have received all the documents from your registration interview and payment of your practising certificate fee we will register you in a provisional general scope and issue you with a practising certificate. Your practising certificate will include an endorsement requiring you to work under supervision in the position you have been approved for.
You will need to apply for a variation to your scope of practice if any of the details listed on your practising certificate need to change as a result of a change to your employment, position, or supervision.
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You cannot work outside the requirements of your scope of practice and any requirements imposed by Council specific to you. If you are registered within a provisional (general or vocational) scope of practice or a special purpose scope, and your employment, supervision, position or location changes, you must apply for an amendment or variation to the endorsement on your scope of practice.
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Supervision is a registration requirement for all new doctors registered in a provisional general, provisional vocational and special purpose scope of practice.
Progression to general scope
Progression to registration within the General scope of practice is not automatic. You are able to apply after you have:
- completed six months working within your provisional general scope in New Zealand under the supervision of an approved supervisor. This needs to be at a hospital, general practice, educational institution or other organisation approved by us,
- received two consecutive satisfactory supervision reports in the six months immediately before your application for registration within the General scope, and
- been recommended for registration within the General scope by your Council-approved supervisor.
If you complete these requirements, you can apply for registration within the General scope of practice. If you do not achieve these requirements within a six month period, you need to continue to work under supervision until you have.
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Application for general scope of practice for doctors on a provisional general scope of practice (excluding Interns).
Recertification requirements
You don't need to work under supervision once you're registered in a general scope. However, you must continue to meet the Council’s recertification requirements. The Council requires this to maintain the high standards of competence and fitness to practise of doctors in New Zealand.
You can enrol in either:
- Inpractice, the Council-approved recertification programme run by bpacnz, or
- an accredited vocational training programme.
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This page sets out the recertification programme requirements for doctors registered in the General scope of practice only. The requirements will be different if you also have a vocational scope of practice.