IMGTI (International Medical Graduate Training Initiative)

HSE National Doctors Training and Planning (NDTP) describes the IMGTI as a way for suitably qualified postgraduate medical trainees from overseas to experience structured, active training in Ireland's public health service. Its purpose is to give access to clinical experience trainees cannot get at home, so that they improve both their own training and, later, health services in their home countries. The relevant Irish postgraduate medical training body designs the training around the needs of the home health service. There are two strands: a scholarship programme and a sponsored programme.

NDTP says the scholarship is currently open to trainee doctors from Pakistan and Sudan, through partnerships with the College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan and the Sudan Medical and Specialisation Board, with the Forum of Irish Postgraduate Medical Training Bodies.

• Doctors are employed directly by their assigned hospital and hold the NCHD contract.
• They have usually completed at least one, and generally two, years of training at home.
• Training usually lasts two years: typically senior house officer roles in year one and registrar roles in year two, subject to milestones, with a move to a new site after 12 months. Trainees have the same access to logbooks, exams, study days and assessments as other trainees, and the training is recognised by the CPSP and the Sudan board.
• Specialties are anaesthesiology, emergency medicine, general medicine, obstetrics and gynaecology, ophthalmology, paediatrics, psychiatry, surgery, and trauma and orthopaedics.

1. Be on a training programme in Pakistan or Sudan.
2. Contact your home country training body, which starts the process. You cannot apply directly to a hospital.
3. Meet the entry requirements in the HSE's criteria, which include passing the Intermediate Module (IMM) exam and IELTS.
4. Recruitment runs through the Forum and NDTP with the home training body in November each year; successful applicants start in July of the following year.

The sponsored programme is for doctors fully funded by their home country for the whole training period. NDTP says they are generally at a high level of training, work in specialist registrar roles, are recruited directly by the relevant Irish training body and are supernumerary, meaning they are additional to normal staffing. Training can take place in any clinical department approved for postgraduate specialist training, provided the post is part of the IMGTI programme. Participating countries and specialties are listed by the training bodies, and queries go to your home medical training body.

NDTP says doctors are expected to return home after the programme, and that sponsored training is not intended to lead to settlement in Ireland. If you want to build a long-term career in Ireland, the usual route is Medical Council registration, often after the PRES exams, in the Supervised or General Division, then a non-consultant hospital doctor post with an employment permit. Our division guide compares the options.