UP to 70 future doctors are to begin training next year at a new graduate-entry medical school in Derry.
The Ulster University School of Medicine, which is based on the Magee campus, is recruiting students onto its four-year degree programme.
Ring-fenced funding from the executive was announced last month to enable a September 2021 opening.
The school will select students who have achieved an undergraduate 2:1 honours degree in any subject. Applicants must sit an entrance test and interview.
In 2018, the Department of Health commissioned a review that recommended that Northern Ireland needed 100 more medical students a year to meet increasing demand for doctors.
At present, approximately 40 per cent of medical students stay and live within 10 miles of Queen's University Belfast after graduation.
The new school will provide access to medical education in the north west and aims to position Derry as an attractive place to study and work.
Students will benefit from clinical placements across the full range of general practice, medical and surgical specialities with primary care-based experience from week one.
Foundation Dean of the School of Medicine, Professor Louise Dubras, will lead the degree programme.
"As a GP working in the city myself, I am continually reflecting on the role of the doctor and the doctor-patient journey. Covid-19 has emphasised that a career as a doctor requires a commitment to lifelong learning and adapting to life's modern challenges," she said.
"The MBBS programme will provide students with the professional skills, knowledge and relevant clinical experience necessary to be a twenty-first century doctor.
"Working closely with our partner medical school St George's University of London and alongside globally acclaimed visiting professors, our medical provision, rooted in the heart of Derry our Magee campus, will provide the much-needed doctors required for the north west."
UU has already received hundreds of enquiries from students across Ireland and Britain.
Dr Alan Stout, chairman of the British Medical Association general practitioners committee, welcomed the latest development.
"The emphasis in this medical school will be on general practice and it is well known that we have massive staffing gaps in this area across Northern Ireland, particularly in the west," he said.
"Practices right across the area report that they have to rely on locums to cover annual leave or sickness absences. Single-handed GPs are desperate to recruit new partners but cannot find people willing to relocate. These issues existed prior to Covid-19, however the pandemic served to throw them into even sharper focus.
"We need more GPs working in local communities there. Recent evidence shows medical students are more likely to stay and work in the areas in which they study, so a medical school based in the north west will hopefully help address some of the medical workforce issues we have."
