Step 1: Get into medical school
Step 2: Complete an intern year
Step 3: Complete two years of core training in surgery
Step 4: Complete six years of higher specialist training in neurosurgery
Step 5: Pass all your exams
See? Five easy steps. It’s not brain surgery, right? Oh, wait.

ADVICE
So, you want to be a brain surgeon? Image: Nixx Photography/Shutterstock
What you need to know about becoming a neurosurgeon
by Jenny Darmody
5 DEC 201721.29K VIEWS
We thought about giving you five easy steps but, let’s be honest, none of it is easy.

We’ve told you before how to follow your dreams and become a marine biologist, a forensic scientist or even a geologist in an easy(ish) step-by-step guide.
However, a step-by-step guide to becoming a brain surgeon would be both incredibly short and to the point yet, at the same time, extremely difficult to achieve.
For the sake of full disclosure, that step-by-step guide would look something like this:
Step 1: Get into medical school
Step 2: Complete an intern year
Step 3: Complete two years of core training in surgery
Step 4: Complete six years of higher specialist training in neurosurgery
Step 5: Pass all your exams
See? Five easy steps. It’s not brain surgery, right? Oh, wait.

The steps to neurosurgery in detail
Looking into those steps a little closer, entry into medical school requires high CAO points and completion of the Health Professions Admission Test (HPAT). Alternatively, you can obtain a 2.1 bachelor’s degree first, perhaps in biology or anatomy.
Towards the end of your medical school education, you must apply for your intern year. Following that, you will receive a Certificate of Experience, which will help you down the route of training to be a specialist.
Entry into core training in surgery is competitive and interview-based. The two years of core surgery training will include a performance appraisal and an exam for membership of the Royal College of Surgeons.
After trainees complete two years of core surgery training, they must compete to progress to the next stage: higher specialist training in neurosurgery.
This stage is made up of six years of biannual assessments, training courses, wet labs and modalities such as the Intercollegiate Surgical Training Programme. Trainees need to complete the curriculum and a final fellowship exam in order to receive their certificate of completion.
Now that you know the kind of education you’re getting yourself into on the path to brain surgery, what else should you know about becoming the next Derek Shepherd?
Personal skills
Aside from the obvious ‘hard skills’ that you will develop throughout your very long medical education, there are some other skills, traits and qualities that would be beneficial to a budding brain surgeon.
Dexterity might seem like an obvious one, but it may be one you overlook until you really have to start testing it. Dexterity can be enhanced with practice – the sooner you know you have to hone this skill, the better.
