Clinical Academia gives you the unique opportunity for a career that combines patient care with research and teaching. This role provides intellectual stimulation, career variety, and the ability to directly improve patient outcomes through exciting medical research and innovation, all whilst training and shaping the futures of the next generation of clinicians.

Whilst this is often more popular for those with some practicing clinical experience, there is no set time to begin considering Clinical Academia. The Clinical Academic track can be thought of similarly to the train tracks of your career journey, where people can get on and off at any point along the route, whether an early or late stop on the journey between A and B.

The Clinical Academic career path is available to anyone with clinical experience, whether you’re newly qualified or have years of experience under your belt. You don’t need to already have a PhD, you just need to be passionate about driving innovation and improving the healthcare system – whether that be by leadership, lectureship or world-leading knowledge-enhancing research.

Examples of who can be eligible for these career opportunities include doctors, dentists, nurses, pharmacists, vets, and allied health professionals such as physiotherapists and occupational therapists.

Here at the University of St Andrews we have an active and growing community of Clinical Academics, working across both our Educational and Research departments. With our ever-strengthening partnerships with NHS Education for Scotland and the Scottish Health Boards themselves, there’s never been a better time to consider joining us here.

Such is the strength of our Clinical Academic and Academic GP network here in the School, we are delighted to be the proud hosts of the Society for Academic Primary Care (SAPC) Annual Scientific Meeting here in June 2026.

There are a number of avenues you can take to making the first step to enquiry here, and this largely can depend on the route you wish to take.

If you want to work with us here at University of St Andrews, you can either contact [email protected] for general enquiries, or you can head to our ‘Research’ and ‘People’ tabs to identify current staff members that may be researching the same area that you’re interested in!

If you’re not sure if research is the route that you want to take, and teaching may be more your style, why not consider applying for a SCREDS post via NHS Scotland or Public Services Delivery Scotland (formerly NHS Education for Scotland).