University of Sunderland bids to triple Med School places

The University of Sunderland's medical school bid details plans to recruit up to 300 new student doctors pear year, up from the current 100 which would lead to teaching a cohort of 1,500 in the next eight years.

This comes just four years after the university first opened its medical school in 2019, with the first set of doctors trained in the city set to graduate in summer 2024.

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Medical students at the University of Sunderland’s School of Medicine. (Image: UNIVERSITY OF SUNDERLAND)

Vice-Chancellor of the University, Sir David Bell, made the announcement as part of a speech to the Delivering Future Cities Forum in Sunderland City Hall on Wednesday, an event which kicks off Expo Sunderland for which the University is a headline sponsor.

Sir David said: “Such an expansion will enable more opportunities for students from Sunderland and the north-east to train as doctors, given that they are scandalously underrepresented presently in the overall UK medical school numbers.

“But we will also attract and welcome students from outside the region and elsewhere in the UK, many of whom we know will choose to make this their home in the years and decades ahead.

Medical students at the University of Sunderland’s School of Medicine. (Image: UNIVERSITY OF SUNDERLAND)

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“I am very pleased to say too that we have the support for this bid from the chief executives of our five regional partner NHS trusts, as well as from other significant leadership figures within the NHS regionally.

“We hope too that many more GP practices will want to become part of our story which will also include a strong element of innovation in learning and teaching medicine.”

Sir David added: “I hope you agree that this is very exciting, ‘game-changing’, news for our institution and for the city.”