Medicine in the Netherlands

Medicine in Netherlands

The route to qualification as a doctor in general practice in the Netherlands consists of three main phases:

• BSc in medicine (3 years)

• MSc in medicine (an additional 3 years) -- Taught in Dutch

• Training (one year)

You must complete all three  to become a Doctor.

There are two options to study medicine at the bachelor level in English in the Netherlands:

1) A full bachelor in medicine, offered at Groningen and Maastricht. Both would require a student to have taken chemistry, physics, biology and maths.  If this is not possible at your school a student could also take a course or exam at Boswell beta. Most universities would accept these certificates instead of a course in secondary school.

2) Some university colleges, among them University College Roosevelt, University College Utrecht and Erasmus University College, offer a premed programme preparing students for the premaster/graduate programmes in medicine on offer in the Netherlands. EUC’s programme also prepares for the School of Medicine (in English) of St. George’s University (SGU), Grenada. These university colleges do not usually ask for all four subjects mentioned above. For University College Utrecht we do not have specific subject requirements for instance because students only declare a major at the end of their first year/start of their second year. More information about UCU's premed programme here.

I have to emphasise that these bachelor programmes prepare for the graduate Medical programmes in the Netherlands, which are taught in Dutch as this is where student start working with patients. They are not designed to prepare for access to graduate programmes abroad. It can be hard to continue abroad given that medicine is a licensed profession with specific requirements that may differ per country, also because health is partially a cultural concept. 

For more information on Studying Medicine in the Netherlands see this link: https://www.studyinholland.co.uk/medicine.html