specific health access pathway (PASS)

How does the year work?

Introduced by the 2019 reform of health studies, PASS replaced the former single first year. A student enrols at a university offering the pathway, follows the health major and at the same time a minor chosen from disciplines such as law, biology, economics or humanities. Admission to the second year of a health course is decided at the end of the year, usually on the basis of written results and, for part of the intake, additional oral examinations. Application is made through Parcoursup in the final year of secondary school.

Why the minor matters

The minor is not decoration. PASS cannot be repeated, so a student who validates the year without obtaining a health place continues in the second year of the minor discipline and may then apply again through a LAS. The choice of minor therefore shapes the whole alternative plan, and it deserves as much thought as the choice of university. Selection remains strong, since the number of places is set within the framework of the numerus apertus.

What does this mean for candidates from abroad?

For a candidate from Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia or Belgium, PASS means competing in French, in the French secondary school culture, for places allocated by each university. Many families therefore look at medical studies in another EU member state, where admission is decided by the university and the resulting degree opens practice in France through automatic recognition. The comparison is between two admission systems, not between two levels of medicine.

A common misunderstanding

PASS is often described as the first year of medicine. It is a selection year in which health teaching is combined with another discipline, and the medical curriculum proper begins with the DFGSM. Another frequent assumption is that the pathway works identically everywhere: the balance of written and oral assessment and the minors offered are set by each university, so two PASS years in two cities are not the same year.