IF YOU LOOK it up the CAO/CAS handbook, you'll find medical laboratory sciences listed as a certificate course; however, in effect, the course is a five-year degree.

No fewer than 99 per cent of students progress directly from the three-year certificate to study for the degree.

From next year, the Department of Health will not recognise the certificate as suitable for entry to hospital laboratories under its ambit. A degree will be the minimum entry requirement. So for new entrants to college, the degree is a must.

In common with other paramedical courses, medical laboratory sciences has always been a popular course choice with school-leavers. This is reflected in the points required to get on to the certificate in medical laboratory sciences, which consistently exceed 400. (DIT Kevin Street's requirement for a higher C in chemistry should be noted.)

Colm O'Rourke, lecturer in DIT Kevin Street, says that though admission is purely points-based, it would be a good idea for second-level students at least to look around a medical laboratory before making up their minds. Work experience would be even better, and a number of hospitals offer a programme to Transition Year students.

Each of the three colleges offering the certificate in medical laboratory sciences takes in about 20 students each year. The numbers are dictated by the number of places available in training hospitals, as students spend third year on paid work experience.

First-year students study the basic sciences - physics, chemistry, biology, maths - and French or German, O'Rourke explains. In second year they begin to specialise and third year is spent on work experience.

The certificate courses in Cork and Galway RTCs are similar in structure and students from all three colleges compete, on an equal basis, for degree places in DIT Kevin Street and Cork RTC, which runs the course in conjunction with UCC.

Students may also decide to pursue their studies in Britain or Northern Ireland, where the University of Ulster offers a degree in biomedical sciences.

O'Rourke says that the most graduates of the degree obtain locum employment rather than permanent positions. Some will also proceed to postgraduate research. DIT Kevin Street is considering offering a taught master's programme in the future.

Michael Delaney, former head of the department of biological sciences in Cork RTC, says that term "medical laboratory sciences" has largely been replaced by "biomedical sciences". "The major change over the past number of years has been the institution of a degree course in Cork and Dublin. This course has been an outstanding success and has changed the nature of the education and the focus of the graduates," he says.

Graduates no longer see themselves as working in hospital laboratories only, though that is still a very important avenue of employment, says Delaney, who is now head of development in the RTC. They are more open to research, he adds.

Cork RTC has recently invested in a substantial upgrading of its biological laboratories. The biomedical degree course is run jointly with UCC with the teaching split between the RTC and the university; The course is probably unique in these islands in that a medical faculty is involved in the teaching, Delaney says.

Richard Delaney of Galway RTC says the college has no immediate plans to extend its course to a degree. Their certificate graduates are not at any disadvantage when it comes to obtaining a degree place, he explains.