Pick the plan that matches your working hours: 8 weeks if you can study most of every day and your clinical knowledge is current, 12 weeks for most candidates, 16 weeks if you work full time or have been away from practice. All three use the same order: baseline, domain learning, Irish practice and law, then timed mixed practice. The Council publishes no question count or pass mark, so the plans aim at broad, accurate coverage across ten domains and steady timed performance over three hours.
What a PRES Level 2 plan has to deal with
A plan for this exam starts from what is known. You have three hours. Each question is a scenario with five options, A to E, and one best answer. The content spans medicine, surgery, paediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology, psychiatry, and a strand of ethics and professionalism, set in Irish practice. The Council gives you two study aids: the Level 2 Blueprint and 90 official sample questions.
What is not known shapes the plan just as much. There is no published question count, pass mark or negative marking rule. So the plan has no target percentage. It has habits you can measure: coverage, accuracy on first attempt, review quality and pace. Pace is the one number you can fix. Divide your practice into blocks that mirror one hour of the real paper and keep each question to a steady, short average.
Before you start, confirm your sitting. Your plan counts back from the exam date, the application deadline and the date you expect to be declared eligible. See booking and fees for the dates the Council has published.
Choose your length
| Plan | Suits | Weekly effort | Full-length papers |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8 weeks | Recent clinical practice, most of each day free | 35 to 45 hours | 2 |
| 12 weeks | Part-time work or good knowledge with gaps | 20 to 25 hours | 2 to 3 |
| 16 weeks | Full-time work, a gap in practice, or a heavy weakness in one specialty | 12 to 15 hours | 3 |
The hours are planning suggestions from us, not Council guidance. If your first untimed baseline shows widespread gaps, move up one plan. Compressing a plan is the commonest way to leave a domain untouched.
The four phases
- Phase 1, baseline and map. Read the Blueprint and the sample paper to see how questions are written. Take a mixed untimed set of 50 to 100 original questions and record the result by domain. This sets your order of work.
- Phase 2, domain learning. Take the ten domains from weakest to strongest. For each topic make a one-page note: presentation, first action, key test, first-line treatment, red flags and the point of escalation.
- Phase 3, Irish practice and law. Read the Medical Council's Guide to Professional Conduct and Ethics, the main Acts, and the national screening and immunisation programmes. This is where candidates trained abroad gain the most marks per hour.
- Phase 4, timed mixed practice. Move to mixed blocks with the clock on. Review every wrong answer and every correct answer you guessed, and log the cause.
The 12-week plan, week by week
| Weeks | Focus | Output |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Blueprint, sample paper, baseline set, set up error log | Domain ranking, list of 20 weakest topics |
| 2 | Professionalism, ethics, law and prescribing | Notes on consent, capacity, confidentiality, open disclosure |
| 3 | Paediatrics | Milestones, immunisation schedule, emergencies |
| 4 | Obstetrics and gynaecology | Antenatal, labour, bleeding, contraception, screening |
| 5 | Psychiatry and addiction | Risk, drugs, the Mental Health Act |
| 6 | Cardiovascular and respiratory | ECG and X-ray drills, anticoagulation |
| 7 | Surgery, trauma, emergency | Primary survey, sepsis, poisoning |
| 8 | GI, liver, haematology, oncology and endocrine and renal | Emergencies and electrolytes |
| 9 | Neurology, older person, MSK and skin, eye, ENT, urology | Red flag lists, rash and red eye tables |
| 10 | Mixed timed blocks, first full-length paper | Pace data, new error log entries |
| 11 | Repair weakest domains, Irish guidelines review | Second full-length paper |
| 12 | Error log, ethics strand, rest | No new topics in the last two days |
Stretching to 16 weeks
Add four weeks in three places. Add one week to Phase 1 so the baseline is a real assessment of the ten domains, not a quick look. Add two weeks to Phase 2 by splitting your three weakest domains into two passes: learn, then return a fortnight later with questions only. Add one week before the exam for a third full-length paper and a calm review. Doctors working full time should protect two long blocks each weekend and keep weekday sessions to 30 to 40 questions with review.
Compressing to 8 weeks
Eight weeks only works if you study most of each day. Run Phase 1 and Phase 3 in week one. Cover two domains a week from week two to week five, then spend weeks six to eight on mixed papers. Do not skip the Irish law and ethics strand to save time. It is the cheapest strand to learn and it is spread across the paper.
How to practise each week
- Topic blocks early, mixed blocks late. Topic blocks teach. Mixed blocks test whether you can identify the problem without being told the specialty.
- Review properly. For each miss, write one line: knowledge gap, misread stem, or home-country habit. Count the categories every Sunday.
- Keep a prescribing sheet. Drug, indication, key adverse effect, monitoring, interaction. Warfarin, ACE inhibitors, lithium and paracetamol overdose are in the official sample paper.
- Practise pace. Aim for a steady average per question, and decide a point at which you mark and move on.
- Sit at least two three-hour papers. Stamina is a real skill. Do them in exam conditions, with no phone and no breaks beyond what you have planned.
A sample week in the 12-week plan
A single week shows how the pieces fit. This is week four, obstetrics and gynaecology, for a candidate working part time.
| Day | Session | Output |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | Antenatal care, hypertension and diabetes in pregnancy; 25 questions | Two pathways drawn, errors logged |
| Tuesday | Bleeding in pregnancy and early pregnancy problems; 25 questions | Table comparing abruption, praevia, miscarriage, ectopic |
| Wednesday | Labour emergencies and postpartum haemorrhage; 25 questions | Flow chart from memory |
| Thursday | Gynaecology, contraception and menopause; 25 questions | Contraception grid |
| Friday | Screening, cancer and law; Irish programmes; 25 questions | Screening ages and intervals written out |
| Saturday | Timed mixed block of 60 questions, review | Pace data and a new error count |
| Sunday | Rest, then 30 minutes on the error log | Three topics added to next week |
When to change the plan
Change the plan when the data says so, not when the calendar does. Move a domain forward if your timed accuracy there is lower than elsewhere. Add a week if you finish Phase 2 with more than three domains in the red. Cut a revision pass if a domain has been green on two timed blocks. Re-read the Blueprint at the halfway point to see whether your coverage still matches it. And keep one buffer week for illness, work demands or a delayed application, because a plan with no slack breaks at the first disruption.
Study habits that hold up over weeks
- Fix a start time. A session that begins at the same time each day needs less willpower.
- Use short reviews. Ten minutes with yesterday's errors beats an hour of rereading.
- Sleep. Memory consolidates during sleep, and the exam is three hours of sustained attention.
- Tell someone your date. A colleague who knows your sitting will ask how it is going.
Sit a timed PRES Level 2 mock exam
Blueprint-weighted questions under exam timing, then a breakdown of your result by domain.
The final fortnight
Stop learning new subtopics about five days before the exam. Use that time for your error log, the professionalism strand and one last timed paper. Read your confirmation letter, which arrives about seven days before the sitting and states the time, venue and what to bring. Plan travel and, if you are sitting in Dubai or Dublin from another country, plan to arrive the day before.
If your plan slips, move the date, not the standard. The Council does not allow a transfer between sittings once the deadline has passed, and the fee is forfeited if you withdraw after it. Use the first practice papers to decide whether to apply for the next sitting while the deadline is still open.
Build your plan around your weakest strand
The plan above is a frame. Your error log decides the details. If most of your misses come from high-yield topics you thought you knew, add short daily drills. If they come from Irish practice, return to the Irish guidelines guide. If they come from time pressure, run more timed blocks. A log with 100 entries tells you more than any generic schedule.
If you are working in another country
Many candidates study while working abroad, so protect the two things that are hardest to restore: sleep and consistency. Choose a fixed daily slot even if it is only 45 minutes, and put the long sessions on your days off. Plan travel to Dublin or Dubai early, check passport validity well before the sitting, and keep your study notes in a form you can review on a phone while you travel.
Finally, write down your exam date, your application deadline and your eligibility date at the top of your plan, and review them every Sunday. A plan that keeps those three dates visible is much harder to let slip.
Choose a pass for PRES Level 2
Full access for 1, 3, 6 or 12 months. One payment, from €28, no auto-renewal.
Frequently asked questions
How many weeks do I need to prepare for PRES Level 2?
Twelve weeks suits most doctors with part-time work and current knowledge. Eight weeks needs most of every day free. Sixteen weeks suits full-time work or a gap in practice. These are our planning suggestions, not Council guidance.
Which domains should I start with?
Start with the domains your untimed baseline shows as weakest. For most candidates trained abroad that means professionalism and Irish law, paediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology, and psychiatry.
Should I sit a full three-hour paper?
Yes, at least two. Stamina is a skill, and you cannot judge your pace from short blocks alone. Sit the first about three weeks before the exam and the second in the final fortnight.
What should I use besides practice questions?
Use the Council's Level 2 Blueprint, the 90 official sample questions, the Medical Council's Guide to Professional Conduct and Ethics and the HSE screening and immunisation pages.
What if I fall behind?
Move the date or compress the review, not the standard. The Council does not transfer fees between sittings once the deadline has passed, so decide early.