Occupational Health Requirements

The following vaccinations are mandatory for all students on clinical courses before you begin your studies:

• BCG

• Hepatitis B

• Meningococcal meningitis

• MMR (measles, mumps and rubella)

• Pertussis (whooping cough)

If you do not have any of the vaccinations listed above, please contact your GP to arrange for these as soon as possible.

Decisions about fitness to study and practise are made by the Occupational Health department during an appointment. The Occupational Health team can discuss any concerns you might have during the application process and can be contacted directly on +44(0)20 8725 1661 or by email.

For offer holders Medicine MBBS (all lengths), Paramedic Science BSc, and Physician Associate Studies only:

When you begin your degree (after enrolment), the Occupational Health department will take a blood test (ID-validated sample) to screen for HIV and Hepatitis C to ensure you are able to work in an EPP (Exposure Prone Procedure) environment. If this screening returns a positive result, Occupational Health will provide guidance to support you to continue on your course. You are not required to obtain this screening before enrolment.

 We want to make sure we can support you through your studies.

If you suffer or have suffered from a serious illness (physical or psychological), or have a disability or specific learning difficulty, please let us know. St George’s is committed to supporting our students and will explore all reasonable adjustments to support you to thrive on your course.

Please contact our Disability Advisor as soon as possible with details to help us establish whether your health history or disability is likely to affect your ability to study or practise. This will also give us sufficient time to carry out a detailed assessment, obtain reports and organise additional expert assessments if required.

Completing the Occupational Health form

We understand that the outbreak of Covid-19 may impact your ability to complete the Occupational Health requirement. Below is an outline of the things in place to try to make this process as simple as possible during this uncertain time.

• Most GP surgeries are now equipped with software to allow for remote consultations.  The GP sections of the Occupational Health form can usually be completed without you present, so you may be able to conduct the whole task via email. Please speak to your GP surgery about how they would like to you proceed.

• The Occupational Health department at St George’s is also able to offer remote meetings with our offer holders. Not all offer holders will require a meeting with Occupational Health, but a small proportion will be asked to attend a meeting in order to discuss Occupational Health’s recommended support.

Covid vaccinations

We do not currently require you to have been vaccinated against Covid-19, but we strongly recommend that you get double vaccinated before the start of your studies, unless medically exempt. 

You will be asked to provide details of whether you have or haven’t been vaccinated against Covid-19 on your Occupational Health questionnaire for our records.

If you are yet to be fully vaccinated, first and second doses, as well as boosters, are available to book via the NHS website. 

If you have any concerns about having the vaccine, you may wish to submit a question to be answered by a panel of St George’s scientists and clinicians who work with Covid-19 everyday.     

Potential changes to Covid vaccination requirements 

We are guided by Government guidelines and therefore change our requirements in line with their advice. This means we will introduce a Covid-19 vaccination requirement before, or at, the start of your studies if mandated by the Government.

As you may have seen in the media, a vaccine mandate for NHS staff in England, which was due to come into effect on Friday 1 April 2022, is now being reviewed by the Government. The mandate, which would make full Covid vaccination a compulsory pre-requisite for NHS staff, including healthcare students if they are on any clinical placement which is regulated by the Care Quality Commission, would mean that all students who are not medically exempt would need to be vaccinated against Covid-19 in order to study. 

Although the implementation of the mandate has been paused, the University continues to encourage all unvaccinated students and applicants, unless medically exempt, to get vaccinated as soon as possible. Vaccination is still the best way to protect yourself, your family, your colleagues and, of course patients from Covid. It remains the position of NHS England and NHS Improvement NHS England that staff, and thus students, have a professional duty to do so.

This information will be updated once the Government policy is clear on the requirement for health and care staff to be vaccinated against Covid-19, following the conclusion of the consultation which is now underway. Please be aware that, even if vaccination is not legally mandated, some placement providers may still make it a requirement of working in their clinical setting so it remains beneficial to you to get vaccinated before enrolment.

You will need to compete an Occupational Health check (and your DBS check) as part of your fitness to practise requirements if you are holding a firm offer to study one of the courses below.

When admitting students to study and practise on healthcare courses, St George’s has an obligation to provide a safe environment for both the patients that you will encounter and to you as a student. In order to do this, we require all healthcare students to complete our fitness to practise requirements, which consist of an occupational health check, and a DBS check.

Completing your fitness to practise requirements is an important part of preparing to study at St George’s. You may not receive an unconditional offer or enrol if you have not completed both requirements.

We suggest you submit your occupational health questionnaire check as soon as possible. For most offer holders, the deadline for forms to be received is 15 July 2022. The assessment of your form will then take place before enrolment.

Costs for the occupational health check varies depending on how many additional vaccines you may need, and how much the GP charges for completion of the form. You are responsible for meeting all of the costs associated with this check.

Please continue to chase your GP for the information you require as it remains your responsibility to ensure a completed GP Report and additional documents are submitted. Failure to do so may mean you are not issued an unconditional offer, or allowed to enrol.  If the deadline is approaching, you are advised to email Admissions to discuss your situation.

If you live in a country where General Practitioners are not available, the GP Report can be completed by a family doctor, or equivalent, or any physician who has provided treatment to you in the past. They will need to have access to your medical records to complete the questions we have in the GP Report.

If you are from the UK, you will need to register with a GP in order to have the form completed.

If you are still unsure, please contact our Occupational Health department who will consider your individual circumstances.

If you are unable to obtain one of the required vaccines, the Occupational Health department may be able to administer the required dose for you. Please include notes about vaccines you’ve been unable to obtain in the email you send when submitting your GP Report; the Occupational Health department will then be in touch to discuss this.

Please be aware that it remains your responsibility to obtain the relevant vaccines so relying on the Occupational Health department should be considered a last resort. Further advice can be found by contacting the Occupational Health department directly on on 020 8725 1661 or by email. 

Deferred from 2021, to enrol in 2022

If you have deferred entry and are due to start your course in 2021, you may not need to complete another occupational health check. Please follow the instructions for Deferred Offer Holders.

Deferred from 2022, to enrol in 2023

If you have deferred your offer and are due to start your course in 2023, please still complete your occupational health check as detailed above, as this is a condition of your offer. In 2023, you will be able to complete a declaration form if there have been no changes to your health.

We do not currently require you to have been vaccinated against Covid-19, but we strongly recommend that you get double vaccinated before the start of your studies, unless medically exempt. 

You will be asked to provide details of whether you have or haven’t been vaccinated against Covid-19 on your Occupational Health questionnaire for our records.

If you are yet to be fully vaccinated, first and second doses, as well as boosters, are available to book via the NHS website. 

If you have any concerns about having the vaccine, you may wish to submit a question to be answered by a panel of St George’s scientists and clinicians who work with Covid-19 everyday.     

Potential changes to Covid vaccination requirements 

We are guided by Government guidelines and therefore change our requirements in line with their advice. This means we will introduce a Covid-19 vaccination requirement before, or at, the start of your studies if mandated by the Government.

As you may have seen in the media, a vaccine mandate for NHS staff in England, which was due to come into effect on Friday 1 April 2022, is now being reviewed by the Government. The mandate, which would make full Covid vaccination a compulsory pre-requisite for NHS staff, including healthcare students if they are on any clinical placement which is regulated by the Care Quality Commission, would mean that all students who are not medically exempt would need to be vaccinated against Covid-19 in order to study. 

Although the implementation of the mandate has been paused, the University continues to encourage all unvaccinated students and applicants, unless medically exempt, to get vaccinated as soon as possible. Vaccination is still the best way to protect yourself, your family, your colleagues and, of course patients from Covid. It remains the position of NHS England and NHS Improvement NHS England that staff, and thus students, have a professional duty to do so.

This information will be updated once the Government policy is clear on the requirement for health and care staff to be vaccinated against Covid-19, following the conclusion of the consultation which is now underway. Please be aware that, even if vaccination is not legally mandated, some placement providers may still make it a requirement of working in their clinical setting so it remains beneficial to you to get vaccinated before enrolment.

All applicants must complete an occupational health check by the deadline, but you might be able to submit all of the required information remotely, or via a nominated representative. The GP Report can often be completed without you present, so a relative or trusted friend collect this from the GP on your behalf. It remains your responsibility to meet this requirement, and without an occupational health submission, you may not be issued an unconditional offer, or allowed to enrol.