Health regulators set their own English rules for nurses, midwives, doctors and other professionals, and those rules can differ from visa requirements. Regulators differ on which tests they accept and whether results from more than one sitting can be combined.
These articles explain English requirements for professional registration with bodies such as the NMC in the UK and the nursing and medical councils in New Zealand, always with links to their own pages.
IELTS for nurses: the UK and New Zealand regulators ask for 6.5 in Writing and 7 elsewhere. How to plan both tasks so Writing stops costing you a retake.
· 6 min read
OET for nurses explained: the four sub-tests, official timings, what grade B means and a step-by-step plan so one weak sub-test does not delay registration.
· 6 min read
Nursing Council NZ English requirements: OET 350 (300 writing) or IELTS Academic 7 (6.5 writing), no PTE, and a 12-month rule for combining sittings.
· 6 min read
How is the IELTS overall band calculated? The average of four sections, rounded to the nearest half band: what .25 and .75 do, with examples to check yours.
· 6 min read
OET C+ Writing for the NMC: what a score of 300 means, why a short letter can mean a resit, and how nurses can plan and practise a clinical letter for it.
· 7 min read
OET or IELTS for nurses? The UK NMC and New Zealand's Nursing Council set matching levels, so choose by format. Compare both tests before you book.
· 6 min read
NMC English language requirements: exact IELTS and OET scores nurses need for UK registration, plus the test formats the NMC rules out.
· 6 min read