Postgraduate Diploma in General Practice

The discipline of general practice involves comprehensive, continuing, community-based medical care of individuals and families for a defined practice population. There is an emphasis on prevention of disease and the earliest possible identification and intervention. The diploma provides an opportunity to address these issues, while still leaving wide choice of subject content, for example including travel and migrant medicine, rural hospital practice, sexual health, and palliative care.

The Postgraduate Diploma in General Practice (PGDipGP) is now a prerequisite for proceeding to the Master of General Practice (MGP) degree. The Postgraduate Diploma in General Practice can be based in any of the three Schools of Medicine and can include papers offered by any of the Schools.

Graduates of the programme will have undertaken an approved programme that is specifically focused towards the varied needs of the general medical practitioner who wishes to take the opportunity of higher educational achievement. It can be tailored to meet the educational needs of the individual, and the qualification can have either an emphasis on understanding of the traditional philosophical basis of general practice, on facets of teaching and learning, on research, on clinical subjects, or on any combination of these.

Students will gain a sound understanding of the nature and practice of general practice, advanced clinical training in personally selected areas of practice, and experience in working with other doctors involved in the discipline. If adequate grades are achieved, students will be eligible to advance to the Master of General Practice programme.

Postgraduate entrance requirements

Entrance requirements for postgraduate study vary by programme with most requiring a minimum bachelor-level qualification in the same field, and some having additional requirements such as relevant work experience and/or professional registration in New Zealand.

A postgraduate certificate or postgraduate diploma can usually be taken at any time after the completion of your bachelor's degree.

If you hold an honours degree or postgraduate diploma you may be able to eligible for master’s study by thesis only. In some cases if you hold a bachelor’s degree you may apply for a coursework master’s degree or for master’s study by coursework and thesis.

To study a PhD you usually require the completion of a master’s degree, or a first-class or upper second-class honours degree in the same area of study, or a related discipline, as your intended area of research.

Check the postgraduate students pages for specific information on the entrance requirements of the programme you are interested in.

IELTS (Academic module) (including IELTS Online) : Overall score of 6.5, no individual band below 6.0

TOEFL iBT : Overall score of 90 and a writing score of 21 The University of Otago TOEFL institution code is 9483 (Please note we do not accept MyBest TOEFL scores)

Pearson Test of English ( PTE ) Academic : Overall score of 58 with no communicative skills score below 50

Duolingo English Test : Overall score of 120 (with no Individual Subscore below 95)