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The person specification, explained

Essential criteria are pass/fail. Miss one and the application ends at longlisting, before anyone reads a word of your portfolio.

Source: NHS England person specifications . Always confirm against the official guidance for your own round.

Essential means essential

The person specification splits into essential and desirable. They behave completely differently. Essential criteria are checked at longlisting and are binary: you either meet them or your application is withdrawn from the round. Desirable criteria are not filters at all — they feed into the portfolio self-assessment that decides who gets an interview.

The commonest way strong candidates lose a round is not a weak interview. It is an essential criterion they assumed they met, or an application section they left incomplete.

Qualifications

Essential

  • MBBS or equivalent medical qualification.
  • MRCP(UK) Part 1 at the time of application, and the full MRCP(UK) diploma by the offer date — or eligibility for the specialist register in general internal medicine, or completion of Irish Basic Specialty Training with the full MRCPI diploma.

Desirable — scores in the self-assessment, does not gate the application

  • Full MRCP(UK) already held at the point of application.
  • A higher degree — MSc, MD or PhD. An intercalated BSc and an honorary MA do not count.

Eligibility

Essential

  • Full GMC registration held at the time of application, with a licence to practise by the time the post starts.
  • Evidence of achieving Internal Medicine Stage 1 capabilities — through a current UK IM Stage 1, ACCS or Broad Based Training programme, a JRCPTB internationally accredited programme, a satisfactory ARCP outcome, completion of UK ST3 in GIM, specialist register eligibility, or an Alternative Certificate to Enter Group 1 Higher Physician Specialty Training.
  • Eligible to work in the UK.

Career progression

Essential

  • A complete employment history, with progression consistent with your personal circumstances.
  • At least 36 months of medical specialty experience, of which at least 18 months must include the care of acute medical inpatients.
  • You must not already hold, or be eligible to hold, a CCT or CESR in the specialty, and must not currently be eligible for the specialist register.
  • No more than 24 months in Locum Appointment for Training posts in the specialty.
  • If you previously resigned from or were removed from a training programme, a Support for Reapplication form signed by your TPD or Head of School and the Postgraduate Dean.

Fitness to practise, health and language

Essential

  • Up to date and fit to practise safely — assessed from the application and your references.
  • Demonstrable written and spoken English sufficient for effective communication with patients and colleagues, to GMC standards.
  • Meets the professional health requirements set out in Good Medical Practice.

Application

Essential

  • Every section of the application form completed in full, in line with the written guidance. Incomplete forms are rejected at longlisting.

The three that catch people out

MRCP timing. Part 1 is needed at application; the full diploma is needed by the offer date, not the application date. Candidates withdraw unnecessarily every round believing they need all three parts up front.

The 36-month rule. At least 36 months of medical specialty experience, of which at least 18 must include the care of acute medical inpatients. Clinic-only or research time does not count toward the acute component.

Completeness. "All sections of the application form completed fully according to written guidelines" is itself an essential criterion. A blank field is a failed criterion.

Check your own specialty

The criteria above are drawn from the ST4 1969 specification and are broadly common across the physician group, but each specialty publishes its own and the details differ. Read yours in full before you apply — and read it early enough that a gap is still fixable.

Once you know you are eligible, the recruitment timeline sets out what happens next, and how scoring works explains how the interview is marked.

This is a plain-English summary, not the specification itself. The official NHS England person specification for your specialty and round is the only authoritative version.

Knowing the process is not the same as being ready for it

Interviews are October–November 2026. The practice libraries cover every domain the panel scores — clinical scenarios, registrar capability, ethics, portfolio and the presentation — with model answers and the Score-5 anchors.

Browse the specialty libraries

More free guides

Recruitment timeline

Every date in the round, in order.

Competition ratios

Applications per post, by specialty.

How scoring works

Domains, the 1–5 scale and the RIS.

FAQ

The questions candidates actually ask.