Medical associate professions encompass four main groups of non medically qualified clinical staff working across NHS settings and within multidisciplinary teams as part of continued drives to provide accessible, safe and high quality care to patients.
Medical Associate Professions enhance the workforce, performing a range of tasks traditionally associated with doctors in training and do not replace junior doctors but play their own part in bridging skills gaps, retaining skills and knowledge within teams, and maintaining continuity of care.
Medical associate professions include:
- Physician Associates
- Advanced Critical Care Practitioner
- Surgical Care Practitioners
- Anaesthesia Associate (previously known as Physician Associates (Anaesthesia)
Training programmes for medical associate professions are growing across the country and there will be further fantastic opportunities to progress your career in the NHS as a medical associate in the future.
If you are already working in a qualified healthcare professional role and are interested in upskilling to a medical associate professional role, this is certainly possible if you have the appropriate qualifications and background.
Training required for medical associate roles
- Physician Associate – You’ll need a bioscience related or healthcare first degree to be able to study at postgraduate level. There are also direct undergraduate programmes which require A-Levels or equivalent for entry onto the course.
- Advanced Critical Care Practitioner – You’ll require a degree in a health related field and have at least three years experience as a registered healthcare practitioner preferably with experience in a critical care environment.
- Surgical Care Practitioner – You’ll be required to have a first degree in a healthcare profession such as nursing or an allied health profession such as operating department practitioner.
- Anaesthesia Associate – You’ll need to be a registered healthcare practitioner with at least three years experience or be a graduate with a biomedical science or biological degree.