Foundation Doctor's 2024 Guide to West Scotland
Scotland Foundation School is part of Scottish Medical Training. You can access our guides for the other regions of Scotland by clicking on the following links. North Scotland, East Scotland, and South East Scotland.
Glasgow is a bit more “rough and ready”- a bigger city, more student-friendly, with probably the best nightlife in Scotland.
Being the most populous region in Scotland, it contains the most tertiary hospitals. This includes the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, the major trauma centre in the region, which specialises in renal, transplant and vascular surgery, with a separate paediatric hospital. Glasgow Royal Infirmary, another tertiary centre, is the regional centre for gynaecology, cardiology and plastic surgery. And Gartnavel General Hospital, located in West of Glasgow, is a regional centre for oncology.
Scotland is one foundation school but split into 4 separate regions: East, North, South East & West. Most of the spots available are in West (around Glasgow) & South East (around Edinburgh).
Foundation School Statistics For Scotland As A Whole
2022 F1 Places: 879
2022 F1 Applicants: 831
2022 Competition Ratio: 0.95
2022 F1 Places: 913
2022 F1 Applicants: 823
2022 Competition Ratio: 0.90
2021 F1 Places: 812
2021 F1 Applicants: 805
2021 Competition Ratio: 0.99
Below is an interactive bar chart displaying the competition ratios, lowest entry scores, and the number of posts from 2018 to 2022.
Please note that the 2022 data for lowest entry score is not yet available, we will update this graph when it is.
How Does Scotland Compare To Other Foundation Schools?
Check out our article "What are the most competitive foundations schools?" for a full breakdown.
Hospitals, Rotation Scores, CQC Ratings
In the chart below you'll find a list of hospitals attached to the West of Scotland Foundation School, and an average of their Rotation Scores from Messly’s Training Navigator. Each rotation is given a score out of 100, which is based on a weighted average of ratings given by Foundation Trainees in the 2023 GMC NTS. The national average Rotation Score is 57 for reference.
Colours correspond to the latest CQC rating of that hospital.
Disclaimer: Please note that hospitals are unscored when there are insufficient responses by Foundation Trainees to the GMC’s NTS survey.
Need Help Ranking Your Foundation Programmes?
Rank your Foundation Programme rotations with confidence with Messly’s Training Navigator. See how rotations are rated by last year’s foundation trainees to make smarter decisions about where you’ll spend your Foundation Training.
You can use it to answer questions like:
👉 Which are the best-rated and worst-rated rotations in my Foundation School?
👉 How do the rotations compare for Workload, Learning and Satisfaction?
👉 Which is the best hospital for my favourite specialties?
👉 Within a hospital, which rotations are best-rated?
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