Every year, a fresh batch of Indian-trained doctors sit for the Australian Medical Council (AMC) exam hoping it'll be their way into Australian practice. Most of them have heard the horror stories, friends who've tried and failed, cousins who gave up after the third attempt, forum threads full of dread. Dr. Shameelah had heard all of that too. And she still walked in, sat the exam once, and walked out with a pass.
She isn't Australian-trained, and she isn't sitting in India either. Right now, she's recording her story from Sydney, having just landed the result she'd been chasing since she first crossed paths with an emergency medicine doctor thousands of kilometres away, in Kuwait.
AMC Exam Success Journey of an International Doctor: At a Glance
| Milestone | Dr. Shameelah's Journey |
| MBBS graduation | BCU State University, Georgia, Class of 2025 |
| Where the Australia dream began | During a clinical observership with an emergency medicine physician in Kuwait |
| Original plan | UK, before pivoting to Australia |
| Preparation start | Since 2025, though inconsistent for several months |
| Final preparation phase | Last 3 months before the exam — 10 to 12 hours daily |
| Practice volume | 4,000+ MCQs across Academically, IMAT, and SFA |
| Toughest topics | Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) and Peripheral Artery Disease |
| Result | PASS, on the first attempt |
| Exam month | August 2026 |
| Result month | September 2026 |
| Current location | Sydney, Australia |
Inspiring Journey From MBBS in Georgia to Kuwait Observership to Passing AMC Exam on First Attempt
Dr. Shameelah's story doesn't start with a spreadsheet of countries and visa timelines. It starts with a person.
She'd originally leaned toward the UK. It was the more obvious route for a lot of Indian-trained doctors, and for a while, that's where her head was. Then she began an observership with an emergency medicine doctor in Kuwait. This is the kind of placement that's meant to teach you clinical exposure, but ends up teaching you something else entirely. That doctor had done his own emergency medicine master's in Australia, and somewhere between his cases and his stories, Dr. Shameelah started asking a different question: why not there instead?
It helped that she wasn't the only one asking it. A few of her close friends had the same dream, and there's a particular kind of motivation that comes from wanting to build a career alongside people you already trust. Once she actually looked into what Australia offered, the range of opportunities, the pathway through AMC, the decision more or less made itself.
She's originally from Uttar Pradesh. When asked, point blank, why she wasn't simply going home to practise in India, her answer was easy. Australia had been the goal from the very start, long before Kuwait entered the picture. Kuwait was just the place where that goal found its shape.
How International Doctors Prepare for AMC Exam?
Dr. Shameelah started studying for AMC back in 2025, and for a good stretch of that year, she was putting in a solid 7 to 8 hours a day. Then a war broke out in the region she was in, and understandably, her focus scattered. There were weeks where she told herself she probably wasn't even going to sit the exam that cycle. Some months, she says candidly, she barely managed a handful of questions.
It would have been easy to let that derail everything. It didn't, mostly because she gave herself permission to restart. Repeatedly. "I kept starting over again and again," she said, and there's something refreshingly human about that admission, no false narrative about relentless, uninterrupted grind.
What actually moved the needle was the final three months before her exam. That's when she locked into 10 to 12 hours of study, every single day, without exception, waking up, freshening up, studying, working prayer breaks into the schedule, and going right back to it. She's clear that this final stretch alone, done properly, was enough. Not the whole year of stop-start effort, just those last three months, done with real intent.
AMC Exam 2026-27 Preparation Tips from Expert
Dr. Shameelah initially made the mistake a lot of AMC aspirants make such as trying to read entire reference textbooks cover to cover. She specifically mentions attempting to get through John Murtagh's General Practice in full, before realising that approach simply doesn't scale for an exam like this.
What worked instead was narrowing down to AMC syllabus' high-yield topics only. She was handed a curated list by seniors who'd already cleared the exam, and found a similar high-yield breakdown available through the Academically LMS dashboard. The best part is, having AMC-qualified, AHPRA-registered medical faculties who are practicing and settled in Australia. Their mentorship gives you access to medical education pertaining to Australian healthcare standards.
In cardiology, for instance, she didn't try to master every cardiac condition. She zeroed in on around 10 to 12 core topics, heart failure among them, and left the rest alone. Every system, she found, had its own compact list of high-yield areas, and once she'd covered those properly with theory plus 10 to 50 practice questions per topic, there simply wasn't more ground left to cover.
By the time she sat the exam, she'd worked through more than 4,000 MCQs, pulling from Academically's question sets alongside IMAT and SFA. That's not a number she's proud of because it's big. It's a number that mattered because it's what let her walk into different question phrasings on the same underlying concept without panicking.
What is the Toughest Part of AMC Exam?
Dr. Shameelah was upfront about the difficulty level of AMC exam. She's fairly certain that a large chunk of her exam, by her own estimate, around 20 questions revolved around deep vein thrombosis and peripheral artery disease. Not the basic definitions, but the layered clinical-decision questions:
- What's the most appropriate next step?
- Which diagnostic approach takes priority?
- What the treatment ladder actually looks like when two options both seem plausible on the surface?
"I always used to get confused with these," she admitted. Some of the phrasing questions asking what the most appropriate next step is, rather than simply the correct one kept catching her off guard. She's honest that she left the exam unsure whether she'd gotten several of those right.
It's a useful data point for anyone prepping right now. DVT and PAD aren't the topics people usually flag as high-risk when they picture the AMC exam, and that's exactly why they're worth extra attention, not because they're rare, but because the exam tends to test the decision-making around them, not just the facts.
FMGE vs AMC vs Non Clinical Healthcare Job: What is Worth Candidates' Time, Money and Effort?
This is the part of Dr. Shameelah's conversation that carries the most weight, even though it's not really about her own exam at all.
She talks about a student she knows of, someone who has sat the FMGE exam 17 times. Not five. Not ten. Seventeen. He's around 40 now, and by her account, both his personal life and his family's confidence in the whole plan have taken a real hit. Nationally, only around 15% of FMGE candidates pass in a given cycle, which means the other 85% are stacking up year after year, competing against a fresh batch of new aspirants every time they retry.
Her advice to that specific student and to anyone in a similar loop is simple. Three attempts, maybe four at the outside, and then it's time to seriously consider a plan B. Not because failing is shameful, but because sitting idle for years while retaking the same exam erodes both clinical knowledge and mental resilience. She's quick to add that a non-clinical healthcare job isn't a failure state either, it's a legitimate alternative to years spent stuck on one path.
It's not advice delivered with judgment. It comes from someone who watched a friend pass FMGE while several others are heading into their third attempt this October, fully aware of how thin the margin for error really is.
Key Differences
| Factor | FMGE | AMC | Non-Clinical Healthcare Job |
| Career path | Medical registration in India | Medical registration in Australia | Healthcare careers outside direct patient care |
| Main goal | Pass FMGE and obtain medical registration in India | Clear AMC requirements and progress towards Australian medical registration | Build a career in medical affairs, clinical research, pharmacovigilance, medical writing, or related fields |
| Who is it for? | Indian citizens or eligible overseas Indian citizens with foreign medical degrees | International medical graduates seeking to practise in Australia | MBBS graduates, doctors, and healthcare professionals looking for alternative career pathways |
| Primary exam or requirement | FMGE screening test | AMC CAT MCQ and, where required, AMC Clinical Examination or workplace-based assessment pathway | No single universal licensing exam. Requirements depend on the role |
| Exam difficulty | Highly competitive screening exam | Challenging medical licensing pathway with clinical knowledge and competency requirements | Depends on the role, employer, and required skills |
| Pass or entry pressure | A low pass rate can make repeated attempts difficult | Requires preparation for medical knowledge, clinical assessment, and registration requirements | Job applications, interviews, relevant qualifications, and practical skills determine entry |
| Time investment | Can extend over several years with repeated attempts | A multi-stage pathway that may take considerable time | Can be more flexible depending on the role and qualifications |
| Career outcome | Medical practice in India after meeting registration requirements | Medical practice in Australia after completing registration requirements | Healthcare industry roles without routine direct patient care |
| Clinical practice | Yes, after registration | Yes, after registration and other applicable requirements | Generally no direct patient diagnosis or treatment |
| Possible job roles | Registered medical practitioner | Registered medical practitioner in Australia | Medical affairs associate, medical writer, clinical research associate, drug safety professional, medical information specialist |
| International opportunities | Primarily India-focused medical registration | Australia-focused medical registration | Potential opportunities across India and international healthcare markets |
| Alternative to repeated exam attempts? | Not applicable | Not applicable | Yes. A legitimate alternative for those who want to remain in healthcare without continuing a clinical licensing pathway |
| Best suited for | Those committed to practising medicine in India | Those committed to practising medicine in Australia | Those who want to use their medical background in a different healthcare career |
Expert Advice for AMC Exam September-October Cohort 2026
Dr. Shameelah isn't, in her own words, a natural public speaker. But when asked to leave AMC aspirants with something useful, her advice was simple and unpolished, which is probably why it lands.
Trust your gut. Whatever exam you're leaning toward, AMC, FMGE, USMLE, any of it, if you believe you can do it, commit and go for it. She's firm that AMC isn't an unreasonably tough exam, provided you give it a genuine four to five months of focused work at minimum.
Theory matters. High-yield topics matter and MCQ volume matters more than most people expect. She'd put in over 4,000 questions before she felt ready, and she still calls that "more than enough," not because it's a magic number, but because it gave her repeated exposure to how the same concept can be tested from different angles.
To Conclude With...
Dr. Shameelah's story doesn't read like a highlight reel. There's a war that derailed months of preparation. There's a book she started and abandoned. There are 20-odd questions she's still not sure she got right. And there's a student she knows who's on attempt number 17, still hoping the next try is the one.
None of that stopped her from clearing AMC on her first attempt. If anything, it's a more honest picture of what getting there actually looks like inconsistent stretches, followed by three genuinely focused months, followed by a result that, on paper, looks effortless but wasn't.
She's in Sydney now. The dream that started in an emergency room in Kuwait has, four thousand-odd MCQs later, turned into a result she can build a career on.
You don't need a perfect run to clear AMC. You need enough consistent months, and the willingness to start over every time life gets in the way.