Is an Academic Foundation Programme the only route into academic medicine?
Absolutely not. It is only one possible route in which allows doctors to sample academic medicine. A regular foundation programme can equally lead into an academic clinical fellowship (ACF) at ST1 level in some areas (e.g. paediatrics, neurology, imaging), and many people will enter academic medicine through an ACF post at ST3 level. Entry criteria in ACF posts will include evidence of academic ability and therefore any trainee will have to demonstrate they have achieved some academic output during their earlier training (e.g. a paper, national presentation etc.). It is also perfectly possible to compete for funding for a PhD at a later stage without having had an Academic Foundation Programme or being in an ACF post from the Wellcome Trust, MRC, Cancer UK etc.
