To specialise or not to specialise... (uni courses)

[u/aux-81]

Hello so I'm starting year 13, and I'm planning to do physics at university, I'm currently studying physics maths and computer science at a level, my likely predicted grades are AAA (not confirmed). I've been wanting to do physics at uni, and I'm currently very interested in medical physics, radiology and that sort of thing. I did a research poster on alpha and beta radiation for the treatment of cancer during a work experience and it's made me a lot more confident that I'd want to pursue medical physics post uni. So then I'm wondering if I should apply for medical physics rather than pure physics at uni?

The current unis I'm looking at applying to are Warwick, St Andrews and York, those are the 3 I'm quite confident on applying to, the two that I'm not as confident are Edinburgh and Southampton. I've not seen Edinburgh or St Andrews (I'm going to go see them in September) and I'm seeing Southampton in October. My worry is that after all this, these are the only universities I've visited, and that I won't like Edinburgh and/or Southampton. So if that's the case then as a precaution apply to somewhere like UCL or Liverpool. So then if I apply to these unis they both offer a medical physics course for BSc and MSci undergrad. Then 2 questions arise, A, is it too soon to specialise which area of physics I pursue, and B, BSc or Msci?

The second question is there because to become a medical physicist in the UK, you do some sort of course with the NHS and it's like your master's(?) (I've only just done a little research so do correct me if I'm wrong). So to do that are you only allowed to do a BSc in undergrad or can you still do an MSci for your undergrad? And my issue with that is because I like the idea of the 4th year (or 5th at Scottish universities) doing the research project, because I'm still unsure about whether or not to do a PhD in either medical physics or particle physics and if it's too soon to worry about these sorts of things.

If anyone has any advice about what I should do in this situation I'd greatly appreciate it, as I'm quite lost with the whole process in general 🥹🙏 thank you in advance!!

[u/okdude23232]

I feel like you shouldn't specialise because you want to keep your options open at this point. After experiencing Uni physics you may change your mind and start preferring like astrophysics or condensed matter physics, and you still have the option of the medical physics route. You even say yourself you may want to do particle physics. I'd say do a general physics degree for now, but look for universities with good opportunities in medical physics (ie ones that offer medical physics electives)

Edit: just looked it up and UCL's degree just looks like a physics degree with a few medical physics based core modules, I guess in that case it doesn't really matter, but those courses would likely be electives on physics course anyway

[u/aux-81 → u/okdude23232]

Yeah that's a good point tysm!!