Project explores barriers to NHS career progression facing international medical graduates

A study by some of the UK’s leading medical schools is exploring why fewer doctors who qualified overseas become GPs and consultants in the NHS

2025-12-15

(Press-News.org) There is currently a massive shortage of doctors in the NHS and international medical graduates are critical to addressing that, making up just over 40% of the nation’s medical workforce. Yet compared to those who qualified as doctors in the UK, relatively few international medical graduates rise through the medical ranks to achieve positions as either consultants or GPs.

A new three-year project, funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), aims to identify the precise reasons behind that, exploring why some international medical graduates see their careers blossom once they reach the UK and start working in the NHS while others do not.

It will also seek solutions at an individual, trust/practice and national level, identifying the types of tailored support international medical graduates might need over the course of their careers if they are to become consultants or GPs in the NHS.

The ‘SUP IMG’ project started this summer and runs until 2028. It is being led by researchers from the University of Plymouth’s Peninsula Medical School, working with colleagues at the University of Oxford, University College London and Imperial College London.

They will engage with international medical graduates currently working in the NHS, educational supervisors, training programme leads, professional support staff, other healthcare professionals and patient representatives.

The project is building on research carried out for the General Medical Council in 2021, which found that international medical graduates’ main drivers for coming to work in the UK include employment, training and development opportunities.

However, less than 5% of them join specialist or GP registers on arrival, and few – 11.6% within five years and 27.2% within 10 years – go on to become consultants or GPs. By contrast, around 75% of UK graduates become consultants or GPs over the same timeframe.

Dr Nicola Brennan, Associate Professor in Medical Education at the University of Plymouth, led the study for the GMC and is the new project’s chief investigator.

She said: “As things stand, around 40% of the medical workforce is made up of international medical graduates. That means a lot of foreign doctors want to work here, and have the necessary qualifications and skills to do so. But for various reasons – including language and cultural differences, and direct or indirect discrimination or racism – once they get here their careers are more likely to stagnate. We know the government’s 10-year health plan for England calls for reduced future reliance on international graduates but for the time being, and potentially the future too, they are critical to the running of the NHS. It is really important that we help them succeed and progress.”

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