last updated 30th May 2024
| Jurisdiction | Intern Numbers 2025 | Intern Numbers 2024 | Increase | Population | Interns per 100K Person** | Annual Salary |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New South Wales | 1162 | 1,135.5 | 26.5 | 8,394,700 | 13.8 | $73,086 |
| Victoria | 985 | 960.5 | 24.5 | 6,865,400 | 14.3 | $83,331 |
| Queensland | 885 | 862 | 23 | 5,495,500 | 16.1 | $87,517 |
| Western Australia | 393 | 390 | 3 | 2,905,900 | 13.5 | $82,893 – $109,650*** |
| South Australia | 328 | 311 | 17 | 1,860,100 | 17.6 | $81,814 |
| Tasmania**** | 105 | 105 | – | 573,300 | 18.4 | $87,000 |
| Australian Capital Territory**** | 96 | 95 | 1 | 469,200 | 20.5 | $77,898 |
| Northern Territory | 88 | 65 | 23 | 252,500 | 34.9 | $84,975 |
| Commonwealth Private Hospital Stream | 115* | 115 | – | varies | ||
| TOTAL | 4,157 | 4,039 | 118 | 26,821,557 | 15.4 |
* indicates based on 2023 Annual Report
** From https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/population/national-state-and-territory-population/sep-2023
***If allocated to WA Country Health you will receive a higher payment
****2024 numbers not yet released
Intern Positions = 1,62 (including 230 rural preferential) across 15 Networks
Annual Salary = $73,086
Length of Contract = normally 2 years
Professional Development Allowance = nil
You have the option of applying through one of 4 pathways:
– Aboriginal Recruitment Pathway
– Rural Preferential Pathway
– Regional Allocation Pathway
– Optimised (or Main) Pathway
Only applicants who go through the Rural Preferential Pathway need to submit a CV and attend an interview. All other pathways are based on applications only. A key advantage of the Aboriginal, Rural, and Regional Allocation Pathways is that you are far more likely to be given your preferred hospital network.
Each year the question comes up. Is it possible to hack or game the HETI optimised pathway. If you search enough you will find various reddit threads or blog posts covering this topic by authors purporting to have much greater understanding of mathematics than this author.
The posts give an outline of how the HETI allocation algorithm works. The algorithm incorporates an annealing component with the purpose of optimizing the outcomes for as many applicants as possible. Hence the name “Optimised Pathway”. It does this not necessarily by allocating everyone to their most preferred network but by attempting to allocate as many people as possible to a higher preference network, therefore, guaranteeing that more applicants get a 1st or 2nd or 3rd preference overall.
The general gist of the blogs written about hacking the HEIT algorithm is that if you are super keen on a certain NSW network. Let’s call this Network A then you should attempt to put this as your highest preference and then load all of your next higher preferences with networks that are not as popular.
You can probably already see how this tactic can backfire massively for you.
There’s a couple of things that can go wrong here.
First algorithm is more likely to identify you as one of those few applicants that prefer the unpopular Network Z and allocate you there, thereby satisfying the aims of the algorithm.
Second, you will be stacking your preferences based on historical data that does not reflect the desires of the current applicant cohort.
And third, if large number of applicants does the same thing then you are probably all going to advantage those applicants that just put down the networks in their actual order of preference.
Take home message. Don’t try to stack or hack the HETI algorithm.
Intern Numbers = 985
Annual Salary = $83,331
Length of Contract = 1 year
Professional Development Allowance = $65 per week for FT Intern = $3,380
Internship in Victoria works around a computer matching system that the Postgraduate Medical Council of Victoria administers. The system had a significant overhaul in the previous year.
VRPA Priority Group 1 – Australian citizens or permanent residents and New Zealand citizens graduating from Victorian medical schools including CSP and domestic full fee-paying students (i.e. graduates of University of Melbourne, Monash University, Deakin University and University of Notre Dame: Melbourne & Ballarat Clinical Schools).
VRPA Priority Group 2 – Australian permanent resident graduates of interstate universities who meet the following criteria:
As well as Australian temporary residents graduating from Victorian medical schools (i.e. graduates of the University of Melbourne, Monash University, Deakin University and the University of Notre Dame: Melbourne & Ballarat Clinical Schools).
Priority Group 1 – Australian citizens or permanent residents and New Zealand citizens graduating from Victorian medical schools including CSP and domestic full fee-paying students (i.e. graduates of University of Melbourne, Monash University, Deakin University and University of Notre Dame: Melbourne & Ballarat Clinical Schools).
Priority Group 2 – Australian temporary resident graduates of Victorian medical schools. As well as Interstate Special Considerations*.
Priority Group 3 – Australian citizens or permanent residents and New Zealand citizens graduating from interstate or New Zealand medical schools; Australian temporary resident graduates of interstate universities; New Zealand temporary resident graduates of New Zealand universities; Graduates from an overseas campus of an Australian/New Zealand University accredited by the Australian Medical Council (i.e. Monash University, Malaysia or Ochsner).
*There are a number of special consideration categories available including for significant medical, disability and carer responsibilities. Check with the PMCV directly for this.
Both South West Health Care (based on Warnambool) and Melbourne Health have a small number of Internships reserved for Indigenous graduates.
The Victorian Rural Medical Scholarship (VRMS) supports career pathways to rural medical practice and assists rural and regional health services to attract, employ and retain medical graduates. The VRMS supports medical students with a commitment to working in rural and regional Victoria by providing financial assistance towards living and tertiary expenses in the final year of their medical degree and into their rural intern year.
The VRMS is administered by the PMCV on behalf of the Department of Health of Victoria. Scholarships valued at $20,000 each are available to be
awarded to final year medical students in Victoria. Scholarship recipients are required to commit to a two- year return of service in rural or regional Victoria (within three years from graduating from medical school).
Intern Numbers = 885 (including 66 rural generalist intern positions)
Annual Salary = $87,517
Length of Contract = 1 year
Professional Development Allowance = nil for Interns but $2,311 for RMOs
Queensland has possibly the most complex internal allocation system of all jurisdictions. With a number of pathways and a combination of allocating certain priority groups and merit selection for others.
Queensland Health conducts the annual intern allocation process in Queensland. To apply you will need to use the online portal and upload a range of documents, including a curriculum vitae and referee details. Note: Queensland Health has also produced an unattractive CV template for you to use. But this also has the status of “guide only”, therefore I recommend you use your own.
Graduates assign a preference to all participating hospitals from highest to lowest (number 1 being the most preferred hospital).
Interns can be allocated to one of 20 Employment Hospitals.
c/- Queensland Health
In Queensland, intern applicants are classified into 2 categories: Guaranteed offer and Not guaranteed offer – see below.
c/- Queensland Health
Note: Queensland is one of the few jurisdictions that offer an opportunity for IMG doctors to complete an internship in Australia. The number of doctors who are successful in doing so each year is rarely more than a handful.
There are 3 pathways for Intern Allocation in Queensland.
After the application period has closed, applications are sorted according to their applicant groups, preferences, and available positions at each facility.
Prior to the ballot taking place a Review Committee considers applications for:
After this the ballot commences.
c/- Queensland Health
Applicant Group A candidates who nominate an undersubscribed’ or equal in numbers hospital as first preference will automatically be allocated to that facility.
Applicant Group A candidates who nominate an ‘oversubscribed’ hospital as their first preference may be allocated to another facility via the ballot process.
There is no inherent prioritisation across applicant groups, the categorisation of these groups are used for reporting for the intern campaign. Each participating Hospital and Health Service establishes individual assessment processes to merit select from their available applicant pool and are not obligated to sequentially select through the applicant groups. Applicants who do not meet the outlined criteria for Groups A, B, C or D may be considered at the discretion of each participating hospital.
Following the completion of first-round offers, the Position Status Report (PSR) is updated.
This is an updated list of available positions remaining.
Applicant group B-D candidates have 48 hours to change their preferences if they wish to.
Queensland Health hospitals then assess applications and conduct their own meritorious selection processes. You should contact each Hospital and Health Service directly to find out what they look for in an intern.
If vacancies become available after the First and Second Round offers, individual hospitals will meritoriously select from the remaining applicants for available vacancies. Recruitment to fill available vacancies will continue until the national closing date for intern recruitment. After the closing date, any further vacancies that arise will be filled via the Late Vacancy Management Process (LVMP).
WA Health and the PMC of WA have previously indicated that they can not make Intern numbers available, as these are subject to confirmation by the Primary Employing Health Services.
Estimated Numbers ≅ 393 including 25 Country Health places (based on 2022/2023 PMCWA Annual Report)
Annual Salary = $82,893 – $109,650 (rates payable differ according to your location and industrial agreement with Country Health doctors receiving higher rates of pay)
Length of Contract = 3 years in most cases with the ability to transfer to a different PEH if all internship requirements are met (IMGs may have shorter contracts tied to their visa status)
Professional Development Allowance = $5,984
In Western Australia applications that meet all eligibility criteria, and all essential criteria are included in the suitable recruitment pool. Once in the suitable pool, selection and recruitment decisions are made by the primary employing hospitals.
As with all other Australian jurisdictions, priority is given to Commonwealth funded medical students graduating from Western Australia. This is then followed by Western Australians graduating from interstate universities who want to return to WA; international medical students graduating from WA medical schools; then graduates from other jurisdictions (other than WA). The priority then shifts to international medical graduates from outside of Australia.
Vacancies arise as offers are declined throughout the process, and these vacancies fluctuate each year and will affect how many students outside of WA are offered an intern position.
So Western Australia is one of the few options for IMGs to do an Internship in Australia. Although you can see from the above it is quite limited.
In WA all interns are employed by a Primary Employing Health Service (PEHS).
In WA all interns are employed by a Primary Employing Health Service (PEHS) accredited by PMCWA. Each PEHS is a major tertiary hospital in WA which has been accredited to directly employ interns and provide a high quality intern training program.
The six PEHSs in WA are:
All six WA Health PEHS recruit through the Centralised Intern Application Process. Each PEHS holds an information session during the application period, with presentations from the Medical Education teams, current interns and more.
Following the close of applications in the centralised application process, all applications are reviewed by PMCWA and a pool created for all suitable applications. Applications appointed to the pool are grouped and managed according to the applicable priority category. Applications appointed to the pool will be offered positions according to category as positions are available and selection processes completed.
Each PEHS is a major tertiary hospital in WA that has been accredited to directly employ interns and provide an intern training program.
Estimated Numbers = 328 (based on 2024 final positions, including 37 rural intern posts)
Annual Salary = $81,814
Length of Contract = 3 years in most cases (IMGs may have shorter contracts tied to their visa status)
Professional Development Allowance = nil
SA MET (South Australia Medical Education and Training) conducts the annual Intern application process in South Australia. There are 3 Adelaide-based Local Health Networks and 3 smaller country-based networks to which you can apply for the priority Rural Intern pathway. It should be noted that whatever network you are allocated to you may request or be required to undertake one or more rotations in other networks.
The Rural Intern Pathway is a strength-based recruitment process for applicants who are interested in undertaking their internship (and potentially subsequent years) in rural hospitals within Country Health SA (CHSA). Rural intern positions provide broad opportunities in unique settings and are best suited for medical graduates with a history of living or working in rural areas or a desire to commence a career in the country.
To apply for internship in South Australia, you must comply with the following criteria:
Rural Interns will also be able to work in the Yorke and Northern Local Health Network in 2025
Like most other jurisdictions, South Australia prioritises its medical graduates first, then graduates from other States and Territories. International Students are given lower priority than Australian Citizens, Australian Permanent Residents and New Zealand Citizens.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander applicants are given priority preference by being placed in the first subcategory for categories 1 and 2.
International Medical Graduates from non-Australian medical schools can apply for the rural intern pathway so long as they have only graduated in the last 2 years and have completed the AMC Part 1, and can meet the other requirements (which are extensive) and include meeting the Medical Board English language requirements, completing electronic medical record training and have residency status or a visa that allows you to work unrestricted. They must also not have commenced or completed an internship.
International Medical Graduates from non-Australian medical schools can also apply for the main round but in this case must have completed both AMC Part 1 and Part 2.
Applications for the Rural Intern Pathway are included in the standard South Australian application for internship.
All applicants are asked to preference all eight rural networks as well as the three metropolitan health networks.
Eligible applicants wishing to apply for the Rural Intern Pathway must preference a rural site as their FIRST preference. Rural Intern Pathway applicants who preference a rural LHN as their first preference are asked additional questions within their application form. And must participate in interviews conducted by a selection panel from the rural LHNs.
SA Health determines which applicants will receive rural internship offers using a preference matching process and the ranked list provided by the LHNs.
The placement of applicants into rural intern positions will occur prior to the placement of applicants into metropolitan intern positions. SA Health will match applicants to specific rural LHNs as instructed.
Within the respective South Australian category groups, applicants are randomly allocated to their highest possible Local Health Network preference.
If an offer is made, applicants must respond via the electronic application system within the specified timeframe. Where an applicant has been made an offer and no response received, the offer will be automatically declined. Applicants are only eligible to receive one offer for an internship in South Australia.
South Australia is one of few States that specifically permits medical graduates from other countries to apply for internship positions. But they are at the very bottom of the priority list. Please see the above information about the rural internship.
In addition to a CV and referees, in order to apply for an internship in South Australia, you will need to provide a certificate confirming that you have completed the SA Health online electronic medical record (Sunrise EMR & PAS) training.
Estimated Number = 106
Annual Salary = $87,000
Length of Contract = 1 year
Professional Development Allowance = nil for Interns but RMOs get an allowance of $2040 per annum
Internships are coordinated in Tasmania via the Department of Health and Human Services.
All applicants are required to apply online. As part of your application, you are asked to preference all of the 3 available sites:
| Site | Number of Positions |
| North (Launceston General Hospital) | 40 |
| South (Royal Hobart Hospital) | 46 |
| North-West (North-West Regional Hospital Burnies and Mersey Community Hospital, Latrobe) | 19 |
You can also preferentially apply for one of 5 places on the Tasmanian Rural Generalist Program. You will be allocated to one of the above sites based on your preference but also undertake a 13-week rural GP placement as part of your internship.
Applicants must be graduates of or graduating from an Australian Medical Council-accredited University.
All applicants are required to apply online. Only one application is required; you will be asked to indicate your preferred place of employment (Hobart, Launceston, North West Region) via the application form. Applicants must list each site in order of preference.
The online application form ensures all the information required to assess your application is provided. The form includes information on eligibility to work in Australia and details on how to submit electronic reference requests.
The online application form requires you to include your University Student Number and your Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) Intern Placement Number.
Candidates are required to attach a CV/Resume and any other relevant information to their application.
A written statement addressing the selection criteria is NOT required.
The Tasmanian Department of Health currently gives priority, in order, to:
The Tasmanian Department of Health will conduct a ballot-based allocation system for placing Priority 1 (Australian permanent resident Tasmanian-trained Australian Government supported and full-fee paying medical graduates) and Priority 2 (Australian temporary resident Tasmanian-trained full-fee paying medical graduates) applicants.
It is not clear at this stage how further positions are filled according to the remaining priorities.
Intern Numbers = 88
Annual Salary = $84,975
Length of Contract = 1 year
Professional Development Allowance = $3,295 per annum with the option to apply for an additional $3,000 or $3,000 for HELP relief.
The NT Prevocational Medical Assurance Services (PMAS) conducts a central review of eligible applicants and all intern positions are allocated within the two NT Health Services:
Each Health Service has a primary employing health service as well as additional placement hospitals as per below:
Eligible applicants are allocated intern positions in line with the Northern Territory category groups. Within the relevant category groups, applicants are allocated to their highest possible Health Service preference, pending the availability of a position.
Intern Priority Categories:
According to the NTMETC the applicant eligibility categories in order of selection for Internship in the Northern Territory are:
Previously there was an F and G category that provided an option for IMG doctors. It is not clear whether this has been removed for the 2023 year.
As part of your application, you are required to submit a curriculum vitae of no more than 2 A4 pages and address the selection criteria. Applications are submitted to the NT Government employment portal.
Overall the intern allocation process is based on an applicant’s category group, Health Service preference, and the number of positions available in each health service.
The two NT Health Services are responsible for selecting applicants and making their offers of employment, applicants are advised via email. The Health Service responsible for making the offer of employment will after receiving an acceptance from an applicant arrange an employment contract for an Internship position within their health service to be provided prior to commencing their internship.
Intern Numbers = 96
(6 of these positions are normally guaranteed to NSW medical students)
Annual Salary = $77,898
Length of Contract = 2 year
Professional Development Allowance = $1,040 per annum + $900 Mobile Allowance + $4,000 Relocation Allowance.
If you want to apply for an internship position in the Australian Capital Territory you do so via the ACT Health Recruitment page.
Most of your time is spent at the Canberra Hospital. But ACT is interesting as it is one of the few chances you may have as an Intern to work in 2 separate States and Territories. Rotations may include secondments to Calvary Public Hospital, Goulburn Base Hospital, and South East Regional Hospital (SERH) at Bega. Because the ACT utilises some positions in NSW for intern posts there is a reciprocal arrangement whereby a number of NSW graduates are guaranteed an intern post in the ACT.
Priority is given to:
– Australian Graduates of ANU
– A maximum of 6 graduates of NSW Universities
– Graduates of other Universities who completed Year 12 in ACT
**2024/2025 Information not yet available**
The Private Hospital Stream (PHS) funds private hospitals to deliver medical internships and support junior doctors to work in expanded settings. It focuses on supporting training for junior doctors in rural, regional and remote areas in Modified Monash (MM) 2 to 7 locations.
This includes fostering partnerships between private hospital providers, rural public hospitals and other training settings (such as Aboriginal Medical Services) working as part of expanded training networks.
Annual Salary and conditions should reflect the annual salary for an intern in the State or Territory you are working in.
The PHS supported up to 115 internships and up to 80 PGY 2 and 3 eligible junior doctor places in the 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 training years.
An annual EOI internship process is run for junior doctors to express interest in a PHS-funded medical internship place.
This process is only for PGY 1-funded places. It opens each year after state and territory governments have offered and filled their internship positions.
The program divides applicants into 2 categories – Priority One and Priority Two.
The Priority One category is for final year medical students who meet all eligibility criteria for an internship under the PHS.
You are Priority One if you:
You are Priority Two if you:
You are not eligible to apply for the PHS if you:
The recruitment process aligns with the state and territory government recruitment processes and the national audit process.
Suitable applications are forwarded to the PHS participating private hospitals by the due dates each year.
The PHS participating private hospitals do eligibility checks. They will contact eligible applicants they want to interview.
You should not make direct contact with the hospitals.
PHS participating private hospitals must fill PGY 1 places with Priority One applicants first.
If there are still places available after the Priority One list is finished, the hospitals can then recruit Priority Two applicants.
PHS-participating private hospitals make their own recruitment and employment arrangements for PGY 2 and 3 junior doctors. This allows them to meet their own service needs.
The Commonwealth funded the following private hospitals to deliver the PHS from 2020 to 2024:
There are lots of considerations when it comes to putting in your Intern application. Everyone is a bit different. Some graduates feel like they would like to be close to home and family whilst going through their transition to Intern. Others see it as a chance to get away and explore a new place and location. And then others focus on the long-term career prospects of certain locations.
I think this last consideration is a little overrated for most. You can generally experience a wide range of medicine in your first couple of years of medicine after graduation and there is scant evidence that this affects your prospects of applying for specialty training posts.
That being said if you have an interest in anything other than Medicine, Surgery or Emergency Medicine as a future career you should probably investigate whether this particular specialty is offered at the hospitals or networks to which you apply.
Unfortunately, the internship model in Australia is quite antiquated and we have continued to use the experience as a proxy for competency when a large portion of the medical education world has moved on. The result has been the mandating of the 3 core terms for the internship of Medicine, Surgery, and Emergency Medicine. There is really no solid educational basis for this approach and one of the unfortunate outcomes is that all the other specialties get squeezed out and few interns get to experience psychiatry, general practice, obstetrics, paediatrics, pathology etc… which ultimately does have an effect on recruitment to these specialties.
So the basic message is this. If you are really dead set keen on doing radiology as a career you should try to track down the very few locations that might offer this rotation to either interns or residents.
Each year the Australian Medical Students’ Association produces a very useful Intern Guide with lots of information about the composition of intern training networks across the country. The 2023 version is not available but here’s a link to the 2022 version.
To meet the Medical Board of Australia’s requirements for general registration, an internship can be completed in any state or territory of Australia.
Yes, you will need to apply separately to each state and territory where you would like to work. You will need to complete a separate application for each position, submit the documents, provide the information required and meet the selection requirements. As part of the application process, each state and territory requires you to include your intern Placement Number (IPN).
The Intern Placement Number is a unique nine-digit number that has been generated by the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) and has been provided to medical schools for distribution to all 2024 final-year medical students. If you do not have an Intern Placement Number issued or you have misplaced it, you must contact your medical school to have the number issued or reissued. Do not contact AHPRA. Note: The Intern Placement Number is not your University Student Identification
In this situation, you do not require an IPN and will not be issued one. You can still apply for internships. But unless you are a New Zealand medical student your chances of gaining a place are very very limited.
All States and Territories Have processes for considering special circumstances. Some of the types of circumstances that are generally approved are: where you may have certain health conditions that mean you need to be close to certain hospitals or specialists; where you have dependents, such as young children, and are unable to relocate due to care arrangements; and where you and your partner want to work as doctors in the same location. Generally, requests to stay in certain locations, for reasons such as work commitments of partners or needs of school-aged children are not granted.
This will partly depend on how long you wish to defer. If you just wish to defer for a few months. Once you have your offer and are in discussions with your new employer make inquiries. It may be possible to negotiate a later start with your employer. Most employers will generally prefer that you start on time so that you are not out of sync with your colleagues. But there might be some advantage for the employer in you attending orientation but then starting a bit later as it will probably help them to fill out roster gaps. On the other hand. If you wish to defer for a complete year. Then you will need to check the policy of the State or Territory that has provided you with an Intern offer. In some cases (for example Victoria) you will be permitted to defer and your place will be held for you the following year. In most other cases you will need to reapply the following year and check whether your priority status has altered. In most cases, you have the same priority status. But, for example, the ACT no longer guarantees you an internship and you start off at a minimum of Category 4. Also, bear in mind that it is unclear how long you can defer commencing your internship. However, the Medical Board of Australia expects that once you have commenced your internship you will have completed this process within 3 years.
Unless you obtained your medical degree from a New Zealand Medical School. Then the brief answer to this question is no. I would love to stop there. And I really think you should as well. But there are rare circumstances where you may be able to obtain an internship with a medical degree from outside of Australia. But the Medical Board of Australia strongly advises against this option and so do I. For good reasons. Firstly the whole Australian medical internship system is designed to ensure that Australian medical graduates are able to undertake an internship. Not for overseas graduates. Secondly (and as a result of the first point) it is very rare to be offered the chance. Some States and Territories will not even consider an application from an IMG for an internship. Others will only do so in limited circumstances, for example, the Northern Territory will accept applications from IMGs who may have done a medical student elective or clinical observership in the Northern Territory and who have experience in rural, remote and indigenous health locations. But even then these applicants are at the bottom of the priority list for obtaining an internship. South Australia will accept applications. But again you are bottom of the list. Queensland will also accept applicants, but only if you have never worked as a doctor. And again you are bottom of the list. A final note on this question is that the majority of IMGs who do obtain a medical internship position each year in Australia generally have Australian citizenship or permanent residency.
Whilst it is theoretically a possibility that some medical graduates miss out on Internships according to annual reports provided by organisations like HETI and the PMCV at the end of intern applications no one is actually left at the end of the process without an offer. In fact, in some circumstances, there are vacant intern positions that are not able to be filled. Only Australian citizens and permanent residents are guaranteed an intern position under the COAG agreement. However, there are generally enough intern positions available for those students who have come to Australia to study medicine and the Commonwealth Private Hospital program offers additional spaces for those that may miss out. That being said. It is also clear that many graduates choose to drop out of the application process themselves. So not everyone who applies gets an offer. The assumption is that some graduates take up similar intern opportunities in other countries upon graduation.
All states and territories will commence making offers for Rural Pathways on Monday 15 July 2024 and will commence making offers for all other pathways on Wednesday 17 July 2024. The National Close Date for 2023 Intern Recruitment is Friday 18 October 2024.
You need to decide where you would like to undertake your internship and accept this position and decline all other positions. You should not hold onto more than one offer as this negatively impacts both the hospital that will have a vacancy if you fail to start work because you have started in another position in another state, and other applicants who would like to work at that hospital who do cannot receive an offer for that vacant position.
States and territories share intern applicant information at pre-agreed dates. This data is then used to identify applicants who have applied for and/or accepted intern positions in more than one state/territory. Applicants who have accepted more than one intern position will be contacted by the National Audit Data Manager by phone or email and given 48 hours to withdraw from all intern positions, except the one where they intend to undertake their intern year.
If you don’t respond to the National Audit Data Manager and/or do not withdraw from all positions except one, the relevant states/territories where you have accepted an offer will be advised and all offers, except for the first offer you received may be withdrawn.
The Late Vacancy Management (LVM) Process runs from Monday 11 November 2024 to Friday 21 March 2025. The process ensures any late vacancies are offered to eligible intern applicants who have not yet accepted an internship position. The Late Vacancy Management Process will be coordinated by the National Audit Data Manager on behalf of states and territories. Please ensure you have updated your contact details if you are going overseas during the Late Vacancy Management Process period. The National Audit Data Manager will send out emails to participants who will need to opt into the Late Vacancy Management Process if they still wish to receive an internship position offer in Australia. u003cbru003eu003cbru003eNote: if an applicant does not respond to this email, they will no longer be eligible to receive an internship offer and their application will no longer be considered in any Australian jurisdictions.
The process is open to medical graduates of AMC-accredited medical schools who have applied for and are not holding a 2024 intern position through the Commonwealth or states and territories at the National Close Date for Intern Recruitment (18 October 2024). Participation in the LVM is an opt-in process -you must confirm that you want to participate in the LVM by responding to the National Audit Data Manager by e-mail.
With very few exceptions, International Medical Graduates (IMGs) cannot apply to become an Intern in Australia. Even if you are able to apply your chances of obtaining an intern post are quite low and you should explore other options. This situation is not to be confused with International Students who study for their medical degree in Australia who are eligible to apply. You won’t be able to apply if you have already completed an internship or worked clinically in another jurisdiction. The States and Territories that do allow IMGs to apply are Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory as well as Western Australia (for Australian or New Zealand graduates of competent authority medical schools only).
International Students who undertake an Australian medical degree are eligible to apply to become an Intern in Australia.
As a general rule the jurisdictions either do not permit or strongly discourage the swapping of Internship posts. Medical Student bodies regularly lobby for there to be a swap process. Swaps are problematic for a number of reasons. Firstly the jurisdictions have set up processes to try to ensure that the outcome of allocations is as fair as possible to the most number of graduates. So it is generally the case at the end of this process that there are very few legitimate swap arrangements available, i.e. if you find yourself with an Intern post that you are not happy with it is unlikely that there is anyone who will be willing to swap with you as they will probably be happy with their allocation. Secondly, the whole process of swaps causes additional bureaucratic headaches when the jurisdictions are attempting to focus on getting through all of the allocations and providing as many applicants as possible an offer. Thirdly, the ability to swap could place certain applicants in a situation of duress, where they are put under pressure to swap. Fourthly, it is very likely that more than one applicant might want to swap. So it may be seen as unfair to allow swaps when not everyone who wants to swap can.
If you are considering taking a year off between graduating and commencing medical school then you will be wanting to explore your options for deferral. The process varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Jurisdictions will not hold onto your internship post for you. You will be expected to reapply the following year. And you will generally be in the same priority category again. For Victoria, you need to apply for a deferral in order to be able to enter the PMCV Match in the following year. You should also be aware that the Medical Board of Australia has specific requirements for registration that limit the time that an individual may defer undertaking their internship in order to obtain registration to 3 years from commencement. After which you may need to seek special approval from the Medical Board of Australia.
Yes. It does happen. Medical Students do meet and fall in love during their medical school days. Jurisdictions do allow for genuine partners to work in the same facility or network. You may, however, have to compromise a bit in terms of your network preferences as in order to accommodate your request you may need to be matched to a less popular network. Depending on your jurisdiction you will either have to make a joint couple application or apply under special consideration.
Yes. It is possible to do your Intern in Australia part-time. In general, the hospital networks prefer you do this as part of a job-share arrangement with another part-time Intern. Job share and part-time employment are defined as a person or persons voluntarily seeking to work less than full-time hours. Medical graduates may request to complete their internship on a part-time or job share arrangement through the annual centralised applications. To avoid discrimination you are first allocated your position and then your hospital or network is informed of your request to work part-time. Hospitals and networks are then required to negotiate with you the terms of your employment. Interns must work a minimum of 0.5FTE so that the internship may be completed within a two-year period.
Every State and Territory has a Special Circumstances or Special Consideration policy. These policies are generally quite strict and generally only cover: – needing to be close to immediate partners and dependents – caring for young or elderly persons – access to specialised medical care. If you are approved for special circumstances you will not necessarily be placed in the hospital or network of your choice. For example, if you are applying in NSW and you have young children and your partner works in Sydney and it is not possible for your partner to relocate, then you will be approved to be allocated to one of the Sydney-based networks.
(Disclaimer: All information here has been sourced in good faith but things do change so you should always do your own due diligence in such matters, we are providing this information to aid you in your application but take no responsibility for any outcomes)We’d welcome feedback from any Intern programs in relation to the accuracy of the above information.
