Ireland – Evidence of qualifications

This page is to explain what evidence of qualifications doctors who qualified in Ireland need to supply to support their registration application.

Below is information about

Medical regulatory authority

Medical Council of Ireland
Lynn House
Portobello Court
Lower Raithmines Road
Dublin 6
Republic of Ireland
Tel: +353 1498 3100
Fax: +353 1498 3102
Website: www.medicalcouncil.ie

Provisional registration

Details of your graduation and award of your primary medical qualification should have been forwarded to the GMC by your university, so it is unlikely that you will need to supply your original primary medical qualification. However, if we have not been supplied with the details of your primary medical qualification by your university we will advise you if this is required when assessing your application.

Full registration

If you have previously held provisional registration you will need to hold:

A Certificate of Full Registration with the Medical Council of Ireland

OR

A letter from the Medical Council confirming that, with effect from the relevant date, your Certificate of Experience that your awarding body has sent to that Council gives you entitlement or eligibility for full registration in Ireland

To apply for full registration if you have previously held provisional registration and completed your internship in the UK you will need to hold:

A Certificate of Experience form completed by an authorised officer of your UK medical school or deanery. Please contact us to obtain a blank Certificate of Experience form that you will need to pass to your medical school or deanery to be completed.  

Please note that you cannot apply using the UK on-line registration method through MyGMC.

Note: If you are granted full registration in the UK, your primary medical qualification may not be automatically recognised in another EEA member state. You can check by contacting the medical regulatory authority in the country in which you wish to obtain registration.

If you have not previously held provisional registration you will need to hold:

A Certificate of Full Registration with the Medical Council of Ireland

OR

A letter from that Council which confirms that, with effect from the relevant date, your Certificate of Experience that your awarding body has sent to that body gives you entitlement or eligibility for full registration in Ireland.

PLEASE NOTE: You should not need to send us your Irish degree certificate because your awarding body should have already sent us details of this. If we have not received this information we will advise you of this when assessing your application.

Specialist register

To hold specialist registration you must also hold full registration.

Your specialty must be listed in Annex V of the Directive 2005/36/EC by the country that awarded it and have a corresponding entry for the United Kingdom.

If you want to apply for specialist registration and you do not already hold full registration, you should apply for full and specialist registration at the same time.

You will need to hold:

A Certificate of Specialist Doctor awarded by the Medical Council of Ireland.

If your Irish specialist certificate was awarded before 20 December 1976, or if you began your training leading to the award of that certificate before that date, you will need to hold either:

A letter from the Medical Council of Ireland confirming that the training leading to the award of your specialist certificate meets the standards laid down in Articles 25, 26 and 27 as appropriate of Directive 2005/36/EC.

OR

If the training leading to the award of the specialist certificate does not meet those standards, you will need to hold a letter from the Medical Council of Ireland or the medical regulatory authority of the country where you are now working confirming that you have been practising in the specialty in which your specialist certificate was awarded for the period required by Article 23.1 of Directive 2005/36/EC.

If the title listed on your Certificate of Specialist Doctor awarded by the Medical Council of Ireland is not as described above or the specialty in which it is awarded is not the same as that specialty listed in Annex V of Directive 2005/36/EC in addition you will also need to hold:

A letter from the Medical Council of Ireland confirming that your training leading to the award of the specialist certificate meets the standards laid down in Articles 25, 26 and 27 as appropriate of Directive 2005/36/EC and that the specialty is treated in law by Ireland as a certificate of medical specialisation in the relevant specialty as set out in Annex V of Directive 2005/36/EC.

Please note that we will not accept a Certificate of Full Registration issued by the Medical Council of Ireland for the purposes of specialist registration. If you are not eligible to enter the specialist register via the criteria outlined (above) you can apply to the Postgraduate Medical Education and Training Board (PMETB) to be assessed via the Article 14 equivalence route. Doctors applying via the Article 14 route will be required to demonstrate that their specialist qualifications, knowledge and experience gained are equivalent to that of a doctor completing a UK specialist training programme in your specialty. For further guidance, including application forms and a list of frequently answered questions, please visit the PMETB website. Please note that PMETB cannot accept CVs/resumes in isolation.

GP register

To hold GP registration you must also hold full registration.

If you want to apply for GP registration and you do not already hold full registration, you should apply for full and GP registration at the same time.

You will need to hold either:

A certificate of specific qualifications in general practice awarded by the Medical Council of Ireland. If the certificate does not clearly state that your training for general medical practice meets the standards laid down in Article 28 of Directive 2005/36/EC you will need to hold a letter from that Council which confirms that your training meets those standards

OR

A certificate of acquired rights for general medical practice awarded by the Medical Council of Ireland. The certificate must state that it was awarded to you in accordance with Article 30(1) of Directive 2005/36/EC.

If you are not eligible to enter the GP register via the criteria outlined (above) you can apply to PMETB via the Article 11 equivalence route. Doctors who apply using this method will have their training, qualifications and experience compared against the standard required for doctors completing a UK General Practice training programme. Successful applicants will be given a statement confirming their eligibility for entry to the GP Register and hence eligible to work as a GP in the UK. For further information and to request an Article 11 application pack, please visit the PMETB website. Please note that PMETB is unable to accept CVs/resumes in isolation and cannot process applications that are not made through the correct channels.