What are the shortlisting criteria/guidance?
Applicant Shortlisting Guidance
The assessment of this application form principally determines which candidates are invited to interview. The assessment of the application form also contributes 20% of the final recruitment mark, while the interview contributes 80%.
The assessment and scoring will be in the following areas:
- Academic qualifications: Max 10
- Research achievement / quality assurance: Max 10
- Professional development: Max 16
- Full and timely completion of form: Max 4
Some detail on how each of these are marked are given below.
1. Academic qualifications: Max 10
This is subdivided into undergraduate honours, postgraduate degrees, other relevant undergraduate degrees and higher postgraduate qualifications.
A first class undergraduate degree attracts 5 marks with reducing marks for a second class honours degree, honours in individual final medicine subjects.
Postgraduate degrees attract marks, the highest being 5 marks for full membership of the Royal College of Physicians and lower marks for other significant academic achievements. No marks in this section for diplomas but these can attract marks in the latter category of Professional Development.
Other undergraduate degrees may attract up to 3 marks.
2. Hospital experience
Marks are not awarded for hospital experience at application stage but the content can contribute to the overall assessment of the application.
3. General practice
Marks are not awarded for general practice experience at application stage but the content can contribute to the overall assessment of the application.
4. Academic / research developments: Max 10
The highest marks in this category are earned by being among the first or last authors of a paper published in a peer reviewed journal. In modern, contemporary research these are the people that carry out the majority of the work.
Marks are also gained by published audit, oral and poster presentations to national or international medical conferences and publication in relevant peer-reviewed and non-peer-reviewed journals.
Marks will only be awarded where the appropriate d.o.i, effective web link or pdf are submitted with the application.
Very few applicants in any year would gain the full marks in this category and a large number of successful applicants gain no marks in this category.
5. Professional development: Max 16 / min 5
This section awards marks for focused pursuit of a career in medicine, which can be in any division of medicine up to this point. We wish to hear, for example, about your academic achievements, quality assurance work and official teaching roles.
All doctors eligible for entry to the trainee specialist register of the Irish Medical Council up to the end of their third year post qualification, (i.e. clinical intern and 1st and 2nd year of SHO) automatically score as an acceptable applicant as they have not had the opportunity to score on career progression. All of these doctors automatically score 6 marks.
Applicants that achieve a score of four or less in this section will not be invited to interview.
Applicants are required to have completed a minimum of 9 months paid full time (or equivalent) post graduate clinical experience either as an intern of SHO at the time of starting GP training.
There is a strict 400 word limit to this section.
6. Personal development
Please describe your personal experiences and achievements which you feel are relevant to a future career in general practice..
Marks are not awarded for personal development at application stage but the content can contribute to the overall assessment of the application.
There is a strict 100 word limit to this section
Full and timely completion of application form: 4
These marks, awarded for full completion of the application with appropriate legible supporting documentation by the closing date, will be awarded by the ICGP GP Training Unit.
