Foundation Doctor's Guide to North Central and East London

Updated for 2022 Applicants
*Please note that North West London has merged with North Central and East London to form the new Foundation School of North London, which you can find here.

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North Central and East London Foundation School is one of most competitive in the country. It was formed in 2018 from the merger of North Central Thames and North East Thames. It covers inner-city boroughs and stretches north to Barnet and east to Romford — all within the limits of the M25. The large teaching hospitals are the Royal Free Hospital (specialist hepatology, renal and haematology), University College London Hospital, The Royal London Hospital (a major trauma centre) and St Bartholomew’s Hospital (specialist cancer services).

Living in London definitely has its perks. Public transport is available 24/7, and there is a seemingly endless selection of restaurants, bars, and theatres to keep you entertained after work. On the downside, London is one of the most expensive city's in the world, and rent can take a sizeable portion of your monthly income, especially in zones 1 and 2.

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Foundation School Statistics

2021 F1 Places: 332
2021 F1 Applicants: 744
2021 Competition Ratio: 2.24
2020 Competition Ratio: 2.36

Below is an interactive bar chart displaying the competition ratios, lowest entry scores, and the number of posts over the past 5 years.
Please note that the 2021 data for lowest entry score is not yet available, we will update this graph when it is.

How Does North Central and East London Compare To Other Foundation Schools?

Check out our article "What are the most competitive foundations schools?" for a full breakdown.

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Hospitals, Overall Satisfaction, And CQC Ratings

In the graph below you'll find a list of hospitals attached the the North Central and East London foundation school. Each hospital is scored out of 100 in overall satisfaction for the GMC Survey 2019 data. The colour corresponds to the CQC rating of that hospital

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A Doctor’s View

“I chose this deanery because I wanted to live in London for both years and enjoy all the cosmopolitan benefits it has to offer. Most programmes give you a year in a smaller, peripheral DGH and one year in a large teaching hospital. I did my FY1 year at North Middlesex hospital in Tottenham which I really enjoyed – it was a friendly place to work, with generally good support from seniors and a mix of both general and interesting cases, due to the diverse patient demographics of the local area. Socially, we were fairly close-knit – which isn’t always a given doing your FY1 year in London, due to the disparate nature of where everyone is living.

The Royal Free is much larger, has a long list of subspecialties and a lot of ongoing cutting-edge research.. From my experience, everyone works pretty hard, but there is good clinical supervision and lots of opportunities to get involved in audits/projects etc.

London’s public transport is good enough that you could commute to most hospitals from a single base – good for if you don’t want to move home halfway through the programme. I based myself in Hackney which is a really fun place to live, and has good transport links to most of the hospitals.”

Emily Taylor, Foundation Year 2 at Royal Free Hospital

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