Lancaster University Medical School Interview

Lancaster University Medical School is one of the UK’s smallest medical schools, with a curriculum built around problem-based learning and clinical placements across Lancashire and south Cumbria. Lancaster is ranked 16th in the UK for Medicine in the Complete University Guide 2027, up from 19th last year, and 36th out of 40 in the Guardian University Guide 2027, where it records a career prospects score of 100 out of 100 and 87% of students satisfied with their teaching.

Teaching Overview

Lancaster University Medical School uses problem-based learning (PBL) for the delivery of its core curriculum. Many medical schools include some PBL within their programme, but it’s unusual for it to be used to this extent. You’ll usually work in groups of seven or eight, exploring realistic patient-based scenarios, identifying what you need to learn and then researching it independently, with an experienced tutor facilitating the group.

HINT: make sure you’re aware of how Lancaster uses PBL for its modules, as well as the positives and limitations of learning using PBL, so you’re able to discuss this rare learning opportunity within your interview.

Learning is also supported using the following teaching methods:

• Lectures
• Anatomy lessons
• Clinical skills training sessions
• Communication skills training

The curriculum is built around four themes: medical sciences; health, culture and society; population health; and professional practice, ethics and law. Anatomy is taught in the Clinical Anatomy Learning Centre (CALC), which uses Anatomage tables for virtual dissection and has invested heavily in ultrasound, so you learn anatomy, ultrasonography and clinical interpretation together. You’ll also use the Mobile Simulation Teaching Unit, a flexible space with patient manikins that can be set up to replicate an emergency department or ward.

The programme at Lancaster Medical School also includes the following clinical experience:

• Year 1: You’ll be based primarily at the University, studying modules such as Anatomy and Physiology, Microbes, Pathogens and Immunity and Foundations of Medicine, with weekly clinical skills training and early patient contact when you meet patients in general practice under the supervision of a tutor.
• Year 2: You’ll undertake a hospital placement for two days per week, alongside community-related activities throughout the year.
• Year 3: You’ll complete several clinical placements, each including patient contact, clinical teaching, lectures, tutorials and clinical skills sessions, with much of your PBL based around real clinical cases and your own patient histories.
• Year 4: You’ll develop your skills further on clinical placements, complete a four-week research module and sit your final examinations, including the Medical Licensing Assessment (MLA), which you must pass to graduate with a primary medical qualification.
• Year 5: You will undertake five clinical placements, each seven weeks of “intensive clinical experience”, two of which are Selectives in Advanced Medical Practice (SAMPs). A portfolio guides and assesses your learning, mirroring the portfolio used in postgraduate training, and you’ll also have the chance to sit the national prescribing assessment.

You can find more information about the programme structure and content on their website.

Teaching Hospitals / Clinical Partnerships

From Year 2 onwards your placements take place in the acute hospitals and primary care settings of north and east Lancashire and south Cumbria, ranging from small rural GP practices to urban hospitals and coastal communities. Lancaster Medical School has partnerships with the following:

• Royal Lancaster Infirmary (RLI), which also houses the Clinical Skills Centre used from Year 1
• Furness General Hospital (FGH) in Barrow
• Royal Blackburn Hospital
• Blackpool Victoria Hospital

Extracurricular / Additional Opportunities

Lancaster Medical School offers special study modules, which allow you to broaden your experience and explore areas of particular interest. You can choose from a wide range of topics including basic biomedical science, clinical science, social science, epidemiology, public health and medical education.

You’ll also complete a four-week research module in Year 4, which builds the research skills that are increasingly important in modern healthcare – and is good preparation if you decide to intercalate.

Following your finals in fourth year, you’ll have the opportunity to undertake an elective, allowing you to explore a speciality of interest within a different setting or to observe healthcare in another country.

Lancaster University also offers medical students the option of carrying out an intercalated degree between Years 4 and 5. This gives you the opportunity to suspend your MBChB studies for twelve months to undertake an additional BSc, MSc, MRes or MPhil, including options such as an MSc by Research in Medical Sciences with projects in areas like medical ethics and law. You can find more information on the intercalation pages.

Selling Points

Lancaster Medical School also offers Medicine and Surgery with a Gateway Year. During the Gateway Year you’ll undertake a range of modules designed to prepare you for progression onto the MBChB Medical degree. Find out more information about this programme here.

Other selling points you could mention at interview include:

• A genuinely small cohort, with 130 UK and 4 overseas places on the five-year MBChB for 2026 entry, plus 15 Gateway Year places, in what Lancaster describes as a close-knit learning environment.
• A rising reputation, with Lancaster placed 16th for Medicine in the Complete University Guide 2027, up from 19th the year before.
• Modern anatomy and simulation facilities, including Anatomage tables, ultrasound teaching in CALC and the Mobile Simulation Teaching Unit.
• Unusually varied placements, from rural general practice in south Cumbria to busy district general hospitals in east Lancashire, which is excellent preparation for working across different communities.

Entry Requirements

The typical entry requirements for 2027 entry are:

• A Levels: AAA from three subjects taken at one sitting, including any two of Biology, Chemistry or Psychology. Lancaster has also published an alternative of AAB where a fourth subject or an EPQ is taken.
• GCSEs: a minimum score of 13 points from eight GCSEs (A*/A or 7–9 = 2 points; B or 6 = 1 point), including Biology, Chemistry and Physics (or Combined Science: Trilogy), Maths and English Language, each at grade B/6 or above. If you don’t take Biology or Chemistry at A Level, you’ll need grade A/7 in that subject at GCSE.
• International Baccalaureate: 36 points overall, with three Higher Level subjects at a minimum of 6 points, including any two of Biology, Chemistry or Psychology, plus three Standard Level subjects at a minimum of 5 points.
• Graduates: there’s no four-year graduate entry course, but graduates can apply for the five-year MBChB. Requirements depend on your degree subject, with A Levels of AAB including any two of Biology, Chemistry or Psychology needed if your degree isn’t in a biological, biomedical or health science subject.

Lancaster also accepts Scottish qualifications (AAAAB at Higher plus AA in Biology and Chemistry at Advanced Higher) and specified Access to Medicine courses. A BTEC Level 3 Extended Certificate may be accepted in place of a third A Level and a BTEC Certificate in place of a fourth subject, but BTEC Applied Science and Medical Science aren’t accepted. There were 130 UK and 4 overseas places on the five-year course for 2026 entry, and the Gateway Year is open to UK applicants only. You can check the full criteria on the course page and the medical school’s eligibility page, and compare schools in our guide to medicine entry requirements.

Widening access: Lancaster takes contextual information into account at two stages. Borderline applicants who meet the widening participation criteria can be invited to interview using a lower UCAT threshold, and applicants who are successful at interview may be considered for a contextually lowered offer of ABB. Criteria include being care experienced or a refugee, or meeting two or more indicators such as living in an area of low participation or disadvantage. You declare this in your UCAS application, the Initial Applicant Survey and the Supplementary Information Form, and you may need to provide evidence. Contextual information isn’t currently considered for graduate applicants. Applicants who complete the Lancaster Access Programme receive a guaranteed interview and are excluded from the interview cut-off, and the six-year Gateway Year route (A104, predicted grades ABB–BBC) is designed for UK students from backgrounds under-represented in medicine.

Interview Information

Lancaster University Medical School uses the Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) format for its interview, and interviews are delivered online using Microsoft Teams.

You’ll complete a number of different ‘stations’ which assess the skills, values and attributes needed to study and practise medicine. Some stations give you around five minutes to read a short piece of information – for example an ethical scenario – and make notes, before you discuss your thoughts with an interviewer at the following station. Each station is assessed by trained interviewers, including university staff, NHS clinicians, public representatives and medical students, and your scores are combined into an overall total. Applicants are then ranked on that total, and offers are made to the highest scoring candidates. Lancaster only considers applicants who have attended an MMI, and your personal statement isn’t scored at any stage.

For 2027 entry, the medical school aims to send most interview invitations out in December 2026, with MMIs taking place in January and February 2027. Lancaster interviews until mid-February and doesn’t make any offers until all interviews are finished, with outcomes usually communicated via UCAS towards the end of March or in early April. Before your interview you’ll need to complete an RSVP form and confidentiality agreement, a Work Experience Survey so your experiences can be verified, and submit any widening participation evidence. More information about Lancaster’s MMI process can be found here.

Top Tips for your Lancaster Interview

• Test your tech early. The MMI runs on Microsoft Teams, so check your camera, microphone and internet connection, read Lancaster’s Teams guidance and book the optional tech check if you’re offered one.
• Use your reading time well. Some stations give you five minutes to read a scenario and make notes before you discuss it, so practise planning a clear structure in a few minutes.
• Treat every station as a fresh start. Each station is scored separately by a different interviewer, so a wobble at one station doesn’t follow you to the next.
• Be ready to talk about PBL and teamwork. Lancaster’s course is built around small-group problem-based learning, so have examples that show you can research independently, share findings and work well with others.
• Prepare to have your experiences checked. Lancaster verifies work and voluntary experience after the MMI, so talk about what you genuinely did and, most importantly, what you learnt from it.

Admissions Exam

Most medical schools require you to pass an admissions exam before you’ll be invited for interview.

Admissions exam for Lancaster: University Clinical Aptitude Test (UCAT)

The UCAT aims to assess the skills, characteristics and professional behaviours required for medical school. The exam is divided into 4 sections: Verbal Reasoning, Decision Making, Quantitative Reasoning and Situational Judgement (SJT). Abstract Reasoning has been removed from the test.

For 2027 entry, the UCAT is being held between 13 July and 24 September 2026. You must sit the UCAT in the year you apply. Applicants who meet Lancaster’s academic requirements are ranked according to their overall UCAT score, and invitations to interview are made based on that ranking. Lancaster will not consider applicants with an SJT score in band 4, and its UCAS listing states that it anticipates selecting candidates with an overall score within the top 7 deciles and an SJT score between 1 and 3. Contextual information is taken into account when UCAT scores are reviewed, so it’s important to complete the Initial Applicant Survey you’re sent after applying.

Lancaster publishes its interview cut-off scores each cycle:

Source: Lancaster Medical School admissions data.

The 2025 entry figures were scored on the previous format out of 3600, so they aren’t directly comparable with the current scores out of 2700. In both cycles a small number of candidates scoring up to 10 points below the threshold were placed in a borderline pool and invited to interview as places became available, in order of prior academic performance. For 2025 entry, Lancaster received 926 UK applications for the five-year course, offered 581 interview places and made 325 offers, with 131 students enrolling.

Our adaptive UCAT question bank will help you to prepare effectively. Using artificial intelligence, our algorithm assesses your individual learning needs and provides questions based on the areas of the syllabus which you need to develop. This means you’ll be focusing on the areas which will improve your UCAT score and not wasting time answering questions which will not have a positive impact on your UCAT performance.

Using the question bank dashboard, you can also easily identify areas which you’ve “mastered” and those which you need to dedicate more time to.

For more advice on preparing well for the UCAT, check out our step-by-step guide and quick tips, on our UCAT page.

You can also see how other medical schools use the test in our guide to UCAT universities.

Tuition Fees

Lancaster publishes tuition fees on the course page for each year of entry, and at the time of writing the fees for 2027 entry hadn’t been confirmed – the university notes that details for 2027 starters are still being finalised. Home fees are subject to the UK government cap, while fees for international students on Medicine are set by the university and are considerably higher.

Check the Medicine and Surgery course page and the fees and funding page for the confirmed figures before you apply. All Lancaster students also pay a small college membership fee, which is £40 for undergraduates starting in 2026 or 2027.

Key Dates for 2027 Entry

• 24 September 2026 – last UCAT test date
• 15 October 2026, 18:00 – UCAS application deadline
• October 2026 – complete Lancaster’s Initial Applicant Survey, which is sent automatically after you apply
• December 2026 – the majority of interview invitations are sent out
• January and February 2027 – online MMIs via Microsoft Teams, with interviewing continuing until mid-February
• Late March to early April 2027 – decisions communicated via UCAS Track

Good luck with your application to Lancaster! For more help, take a look at our guides to applying to medical school and the best medical schools in the UK.