Regulating doctors, ensuring good medical practice

List of Registered Medical Practitioners - statistics

Registration statistics

This page contains statistical information about doctors on the List of Registered Medical Practitioners (LRMP) the General Practitioners (GP) Register and the Specialist Register. The statistics are updated on a monthly basis and were last updated on 10 January 2013.

The LRMP contains details of doctors registered to practise medicine in the United Kingdom. The GP Register contains a list of doctors who are registered to practise as General Practitioners in the United Kingdom. The Specialist Register is a register of doctors who are eligible to work as substantive, fixed term or honorary consultants in the health service in the UK. To work as a GP or consultant doctors must be registered on the GP/Specialist Register as well as the LRMP. Doctors must also have a licence to practise in order to perform the duties of a doctor and treat patients. More information about registration and licensing can be found within The Medical Register and Licensing sections of the website.

If you have any suggestions about other statistical information you would like to be included on this page, please contact foi@gmc-uk.org or call 0161 923 6365. For more details about accessing information, please go to the Accessing Information section of the website.

Below is a list of all the tables and charts available. These are separated into the current statistics and those covering the period of 2001 to 2011.

Current Statistics

Registration status on the LRMP

Registration status	No. of doctors	%	No. of doctors licensed	%
Full registration	199,479	79.01%	184,918	78.35%
Full registration in an Approved Practice Setting*	44,999	17.82%	43,200	18.30%
Provisional registration	7,948	3.15%	7,845	3.32%
Temporary full registration for special purpose registrations**	24	0.01%	24	0.01%
Visiting EEA registration***	19	0.01%	19	0.01%
Total doctors registered on LRMP	252,469	100.00%	236,006	100.00%

*Approved practice settings (APS) are organisations approved by the GMC as suitable for doctors who are new to full registration, or returning to the medical register after a prolonged absence.

**Special purpose registration allows doctors to be registered for a temporary period in order to treat non-UK nationals within the UK. This includes visiting eminent specialists.

***Visiting EEA registration refers to doctors who are European Economic Area nationals wishing to work in the UK temporarily. They are registered through a fast track process and placed on the visiting EEA practitioners list.

Doctors on the GP and Specialist Registers

Register*	No. of doctors	%	No. of doctors licensed	%
Specialist Register	74,898	29.67%	70,551	29.89%
GP Register	62,440	24.73%	59,912	25.39%
Total no. of doctors on LRMP	252,469	100.00%	236,006	100.00%

*Please note that doctors can be registered on both the GP and Specialist Registers.

Doctors by gender for each register

	LRMP		Specialist Register		GP Register
Gender	No. of doctors	%	No. of doctors	%	No. of doctors	%
Man	143,396	56.8%	51,714	69.0%	32,679	52.3%
Woman	109,073	43.2%	23,184	31.0%	29,761	47.7%
Total	252,469	100.00%	74,730	100.00%	62,441	100.0%

Doctors by age group

Age group	No. of doctors	%
<= 25	10,204	4.04%
26 - 35	71,997	28.52%
36 - 45	72,563	28.74%
46 - 55	51,913	20.56%
56 - 65	27,651	10.95%
> 65	11,312	4.48%
No Birth Date	6,829	2.70%
Grand total	252,469	100.00%

Doctors by World Region of Primary Medical Qualification (PMQ)

The World Region of PMQ refers to the region in which a doctor gained their initial qualification and therefore does not necessarily reflect the nationality of the doctor.

PMQ World Region	No. of doctors	%	No. of GPs	%	No. of Specialists	%
EEA (excluding UK)	25,525	10.1%	3,924	6.3%	11,515	15.4%
International	67,109	26.6%	10,256	16.4%	17,776	23.7%
UK	159,835	63.3%	48,260	77.3%	45,617	60.9%
Total	252,469	100.00%	62,440	100.00%	74,899	100.00%

Doctors registered on LRMP by World Region of PMQ

Top 20 countries of qualification

PMQ country	No. of doctors	%
United Kingdom	159,835	63.3%
India	25,324	10.0%
Pakistan	8,999	3.6%
South Africa	5,691	2.3%
Ireland	4,006	1.6%
Nigeria	3,940	1.6%
Germany	3,288	1.3%
Egypt	3,139	1.2%
Greece	2,708	1.1%
Italy	2,504	1.0%
Sri Lanka	2,331	0.9%
Iraq	2,303	0.9%
Romania	1,999	0.8%
Australia	1,990	0.8%
Poland	1,925	0.8%
Hungary	1,432	0.6%
Sudan	1,420	0.6%
Spain	1,397	0.6%
Czech Republic	1,079	0.4%
Bangladesh	864	0.3%
Total	236,174	93.7%

Top 20 specialties

Please note that doctors with more than one speciality will be counted within each speciality and therefore will have been counted more than once.

Specialty	Rank	No. of doctors	% of Specialist Register
Anaesthetics	1	10,097	11.76%
General (internal) medicine	2	8,896	10.36%
General psychiatry	3	5,418	6.31%
Paediatrics	4	5,118	5.96%
Clinical radiology	5	4,599	5.36%
General surgery	6	4,239	4.94%
Obstetrics and gynaecology	7	3,860	4.49%
Trauma and orthopaedic surgery	8	3,832	4.46%
Ophthalmology	9	2,242	2.61%
Histopathology	10	2,050	2.39%
Cardiology	11	1,947	2.27%
Respiratory medicine	12	1,554	1.81%
Public health medicine	13	1,477	1.72%
Geriatrics	14	1,392	1.62%
Child and adolescent psychiatry	15	1,389	1.62%
Old age psychiatry	16	1,363	1.59%
Haematology	17	1,360	1.58%
Endocrinology and diabetes mellitus	18	1,273	1.48%
Urology	19	1,257	1.46%
Otolaryngology	20	1,239	1.44%
Total	-	64,602	75.23%

Doctors by ethnicity level 1 and 2

Ethnic origin	Ethnic origin - Level 2	No. of doctors	%
Asian or Asian British	Any other Asian background	8,053	3.2%
	Bangladeshi	1,371	0.5%
	Indian	29,472	11.7%
	Pakistani	9,357	3.7%
	Unspecified	42	0.0%
Black or Black British	African	6,130	2.4%
	Any other Black background	545	0.2%
	Caribbean	552	0.2%
	Unspecified	22	0.0%
Mixed	Any other mixed background	1,692	0.7%
	Unspecified	1	0.0%
	White and Asian	1,252	0.5%
	White and Black African	798	0.3%
	White and Black Caribbean	231	0.1%
Not stated	Not stated	7,510	3.0%
Other Ethnic Groups	Any other ethnic group	5,356	2.1%
	Chinese	4,144	1.6%
	Unspecified	33	0.0%
Unspecified	Unspecified	52,883	20.9%
White	Any other White background	23,697	9.4%
	British	94,550	37.5%
	Irish	4,652	1.8%
	Unspecified	126	0.0%
Grand Total		252,469	100.0%