You need to choose your university and are considering health professions? You certainly can’t know what they are and what opportunities they offer. To help you decide, in this article, we present those available in Italy.
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Health professions in Italy
There are 22 study programs of this type, available in almost all public universities in Italy. Some are better known and in demand, but it is important that you do not stop to consider only these. The training offer is very broad and includes other less known courses, but no less interesting. They are all listed by degree class.
1. Nursing and Midwifery Professions
This class includes all undergraduate courses in the nursing and midwifery branch: nursing; pediatric nursing; midwifery.
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2. Rehabilitation Professions
This class includes all degree programs that address the world of rehabilitation:
- Professional teaching;
- Physiotherapy;
- Orthotics;
- Orthoptics and ophthalmological assistance;
- Podiatry;
- Psychiatric rehabilitation techniques;
- Neurotherapy and psychomotricity of developmental age;
- Occupational therapy.
3. Technical Professions
The third-degree class includes all technical health professions: Dietetics; Dental hygiene; Audiometric techniques; Medical radiology techniques, imaging and radiotherapy; Neuro-pathophysiology; Biomedical laboratory; Cardiovascular physiopathology and cardiovascular perfusion; Audio-prosthetic techniques; orthopedic techniques.
4. Prevention Professions
Finally, the graduated class of prevention professions involves all individuals with a preventive orientation. Here they are:
- Health care;
- Prevention techniques in the environment and workplace.
Entry into Health Professions
To practice any of these professions, you must obtain the corresponding degree. Keep in mind that this is a closed-number faculty, so to access one of these courses, you will always have to take and pass the health professions admission test. Since access is nationwide, the selection takes place on the same day at all state universities. For 2020, it will be on September 9.
Admission Statistics
According to data from the September 2019 competition, the most “symbolic” health professions among candidates for the test are the higher education courses for nurses (22,857 candidates for 15,034 places across Italy) and physiotherapists (25,585 candidates for 2,097 places). Following them are Speech therapists (6,562 candidates for 771 seats), midwives (5,740 candidates for 810 seats), medical radiology technicians (3,710 candidates for 734 seats), and dietitians (3,034 candidates for 377 seats).
As you can see, the degree of selection varies greatly depending on the course. It ranges from the highest in physiotherapy (12.2 candidates for each place) to the lowest in occupational therapy (0.9 candidates for each place). So, if you are afraid of not being admitted, you might consider participating in less crowded courses (nursing, professional educator, health assistant, audiometric technician, or the aforementioned occupational therapist). Of course, these are very different professional profiles, but it is not to say that they do not offer interesting opportunities.
Local Rankings
Also keep in mind that the test is national and takes place on the same day, but the ranking is local, so it is established by each university location based on its own places. To learn in detail how rankings work at each university, you can consult the analysis of competition notices for health professions.
A Plan B for Medicine?
Often, the health professions test represents the “Plan B” in case of non-admission to medicine. To avoid missing the year, many students take one of these courses and then retake the test the following year: these are actually courses related to medicine in the subjects covered during the first year. Given the high selection rates, as a “Plan B,” this solution may be too ambitious, but since the preparation for the health professions test is similar to that required for medicine, it can still be useful.
Preparing for the Test
Now that you have a general picture of the health professions, you can plan the preparation path for the tests that suits you best. You can choose from a variety of tools:
- specific books for preparing for the health professions exam,
- preparatory courses, in-class or online, for the health professions assessment active throughout Italy,
- online learning platform for testing health professions.
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