🇩🇪 Non 🇪🇺 EU/EEA graduates: What can I do if my medical studies were judged to be “not equal” (🇩🇪 nicht gleich)

We explained in a previous article how non-EU/EEA doctors could avoid a medical knowledge exam (🇩🇪 eine Kenntnisprüfung).

🇩🇪 Avoiding a medical knowledge exam (🇩🇪 die Kenntnisprüfung) for doctors who studied in non-EU/EEA countries 🇪🇺

The short answer is:

If you requested your univeristy curriculum to be evaluated if it is similiar to that of German universiteis
(🇩🇪 Gleichwertigkeitsverfahren)

Your curriculum is then judged to be either (only one of two possiblities; never a third possibilty):

Equal (🇩🇪 gleich)  😄	not equal (🇩🇪 nicht gleich) 😥
Congratulations 🎉💐 You are treated now like 🇪🇺 EU/EEA graduates. You only need a medical langauge exam (🇩🇪 die Fachsprachenprüfung). (You do not need to read this article any longer. The steps for you are here, except step number 9)	What happens then? Please continue reading.

• What happens when the evaluation of my curriculum (🇩🇪 die Gleichwertigkeitsprüfung) comes to the result that my medical studies are not equal (🇩🇪 gleich) to medical studies in Germany?

If this is the case, they will send you the result of the evaluation (🇩🇪 die Begutachtung) of your curriculum and tell you:

what is missing in your curriculum. They will specifiy and tell you what you did not study in medical school or what you did not study “enough”
(mostly, topics like palliative medicine or geriatrics).

As a result of the above, they tell you that you have then one of two options (there is never a third option!):

Do the medical knowledeg exam (🇩🇪 die Kenntnisprüfung) – You should register to get an appointment. It usually takes months. So, do it quickly. – That you can apply for a temporary medical license (🇩🇪 eine Berufserlaubnis) and try to find a job until you do the exam. The differences between a Berufserlaubnis and an Approbation are explained in the following article.

Make an appeal against the decision (🇩🇪 einen Widerspruch einlegen)

• What does making an appeal mean?

You write a mail explaining either:

(1) You really studied what they think is missing/not good enough: Sometimes, the curriculum is not good translated or not good explained and the doctors really studied the missing topics. So in your appeal you will explain that and more importantly, you can attach a document from your university explaining how you actually learnt the missing topics.

(2) That you have a professional experience that might work as an altenative to the missing subjects in your curriculum: For example, you could send employer’s references that you worked after graduation for one year in a hospital and during that you worked with Geriatric patients for like 300 hours.

There are of course professional experts and lawyers that can help you with your appeal. This is certainly not cheap, but probably gives you better chances.

Our suggestion is to ask graduates from your univeristy, if they ever got a recognition in the approbation authority. If yes, ask them what they did differently and what they wrote in teir appeal. You can always ask in all of our groups (links below). Please sate clearly where you studied, in which country and which year. The curricula (plural of curriculum) change over time and they might have been recognized in the medical license authority and no longer, or vice versa :).

Want to learn more? Questions?
Join JETZT (🇺🇸 now) all of our groups & ask what you like
(On mobile phone: The links are at the end of this page/ On PC: On the right side)