Overview
- Degree awarded
- Master of Laws (LLM)
- Duration
- 1 year
- Entry requirements
-
We require a UK bachelor's degree with a First or Upper Second (2.1) classification or the overseas equivalent in Law. Candidates should demonstrate a strong background in Law modules relevant to the course, including Public Law and Contract Law and achieve scores of 2.1 or above in relevant modules.
When assessing your academic record, we consider the grades you have achieved and the standing of the institution where you studied your qualification.
Applicants who do not satisfy the entry requirements for direct entry onto our LLM course may wish to be considered for entry onto the Postgraduate Diploma course. - How to apply
-
If you would like to study this course 100% online, please check out the Healthcare Ethics and Law online learning page.
Course options
| Full-time | Part-time | Full-time distance learning | Part-time distance learning | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LLM | Y | Y | N | Y |
Course overview
- Develop your knowledge of medical law, and how medical law is shaped by ethical arguments and concerns.
- Take a course that is both flexible and interdisciplinary, and comes with a solid legal component.
- Apply bioethical and legal theory to real-world scenarios.
Open days
These are an opportunity to find out about the course, meet students and staff, and tour the campus and facilities.
If you receive an offer, we will invite you to a visit day where you learn about the School, teaching and learning, study opportunities and student life.
Fees
For entry in the academic year beginning September 2025, the tuition fees are as follows:
-
LLM (full-time)
UK students (per annum): £16,000
International, including EU, students (per annum): £29,500 -
LLM (part-time)
UK students (per annum): £8,000
International, including EU, students (per annum): £14,750 -
LLM (part-time distance learning)
UK students (per annum): 7250 per annum, 14500 in total
International, including EU, students (per annum): 7250 per annum, 14500 in total
Further information for EU students can be found on our dedicated EU page.
The fees quoted above will be fully inclusive for the course tuition, administration and computational costs during your studies.
All fees for entry will be subject to yearly review and incremental rises per annum are also likely over the duration of courses lasting more than a year for UK/EU students (fees are typically fixed for International students, for the course duration at the year of entry). For general fees information please visit: postgraduate fees . Always contact the department if you are unsure which fee applies to your qualification award and method of attendance.
Self-funded international applicants for this course will be required to pay a deposit of £1000 towards their tuition fees before a confirmation of acceptance for studies (CAS) is issued. This deposit will only be refunded if immigration permission is refused. We will notify you about how and when to make this payment.
Policy on additional costs
All students should normally be able to complete their programme of study without incurring additional study costs over and above the tuition fee for that programme. Any unavoidable additional compulsory costs totalling more than 1% of the annual home undergraduate fee per annum, regardless of whether the programme in question is undergraduate or postgraduate taught, will be made clear to you at the point of application. Further information can be found in the University's Policy on additional costs incurred by students on undergraduate and postgraduate taught programmes (PDF document, 91KB).
Scholarships/sponsorships
For information on available funding, please see fees and funding or search the University's postgraduate funding database .
Contact details
- School/Faculty
- School of Social Sciences
- Contact name
- Postgraduate Taught Admissions Team
- Telephone
- +44 (0) 161 306 5500
- pg-law@manchester.ac.uk
- Website
- https://www.socialsciences.manchester.ac.uk/law/
- School/Faculty
-
See: School Subjects
Courses in related subject areas
Use the links below to view lists of courses in related subject areas.
Entry requirements
Academic entry qualification overview
We require a UK bachelor's degree with a First or Upper Second (2.1) classification or the overseas equivalent in Law. Candidates should demonstrate a strong background in Law modules relevant to the course, including Public Law and Contract Law and achieve scores of 2.1 or above in relevant modules.
When assessing your academic record, we consider the grades you have achieved and the standing of the institution where you studied your qualification.
Applicants who do not satisfy the entry requirements for direct entry onto our LLM course may wish to be considered for entry onto the Postgraduate Diploma course.English language
Applicants whose first language is not English should meet the following language requirements:
- IELTS Academic test score of 7 overall, including 7 in writing with no further component score below 6.5
- TOEFL IBT 100 with 25 in writing and no further score below 22 in each section. TOEFL code for Manchester is 0757
- Pearson Test of English (PTE) score of 76 overall, with 76 in writing and no further score below 70
Further information on accepted language requirements can be found here .
Pre-Sessional English Courses
We will consider applicants who do not meet these scores but you may be required to complete a pre-sessional English language course at the University of Manchester prior to the start of the course.
To be considered for a pre-sessional English language course for this programme we require the following minimum IELTS (Academic) scores:
6 Week Pre-Sessional Course : IELTS 6.5 overall with 6.5 in writing and no more than one sub-skill of 6.0.
10 Week Pre-sessional Course : IELTS 6.0 overall with 6.0 or above in each sub-skill
If you have not yet completed your current academic study and are interested in studying a pre-sessional course, you must hold an IELTS for UKVI (Academic) test certificate to ensure that you are eligible for a separate visa for the English language course.
English language test validity
Some English Language test results are only valid for two years. Your English Language test report must be valid on the start date of the course.
Applicants from Majority English-speaking countries
If you are a national of a majority English-speaking country (or have studied for a full bachelor's degree or higher from one of these countries) you may be exempt from submitting further evidence of English language proficiency.
Other international entry requirements
We accept a range of qualifications from across the globe. To help international students, the university provides specific information for many individual countries. Please see our country-specific information page for guidance on the academic and English language qualifications which may be accepted from your country.
Application and selection
How to apply
If you would like to study this course 100% online, please check out the Healthcare Ethics and Law online learning page.
Advice to applicants
As there is a high demand for our courses we operate a staged admissions process with selection deadlines throughout the year. Due to the competition for places and high quality of applications that we receive, we give preference to students from high ranking institutions and with grades above our minimum entry requirements.
Please ensure you submit all supporting documentation with your application before the application deadline to avoid a delay in processing.
Applications for 2025 entry:
Stage 1: Application received by 7th December 2024 ; Application update by 21st February 2025
Stage 2: Application received by 2nd March 2025 ; Application update by 1st May 2025
Stage 3: Application received by 4th May 2025 ; Application update by 5th June 2025
Stage 4: Application received by 1st July 2025 ; Application update by 25th July 2025
Whilst we aim to give you a decision on your application by the deadline date, in some instances due to the competition for places and the volume of applications received, it may be necessary to roll your application forward to the next deadline date.
Applications received after our final selection deadline will be considered at our discretion if places are still available.
Please note: All places are subject to availability and if you apply at one of the later stages, some courses may already be reaching capacity or be closed to further applications. We, therefore, recommend that you apply early in the cycle to avoid disappointment.
Tuition fee deposits
If you are successful in receiving an offer, you will be required to pay a tuition fee deposit of £1,000 by the deadline stated in your offer letter to confirm your place. We ask for the deposit as competition for places is high and there is limited availability. The deposit amount is then deducted from your tuition fees when you register on the course.
Re-applications
Course details
Course description
The LLM in Healthcare Ethics and Law provides high-quality education in healthcare ethics and healthcare law. There is an emphasis on the application of bioethical and legal theory to real-world scenarios, catering to the practical needs of healthcare and legal professionals and those in related fields.
You will study a wide variety of ethical and legal subjects including:
- autonomy;
- consent;
- refusal of treatment;
- confidentiality;
- the moral status of the foetus;
- resource allocation;
- genetic testing;
- HIV testing;
- medical malpractice;
- clinical negligence;
- organ and tissue transplantation;
- fertility treatment;
- genetic manipulation;
- research ethics;
- stem cell research;
- euthanasia.
This course requires the study of both ethics and law, but with a bias towards law in the taught units. On the distance learning course, all options taken must be law-based. On the campus-based course, the majority of options should be law-based.
Aims
This course will allow you to develop an expert knowledge and understanding of bioethical and medico-legal theories, and the skills needed to apply them to real world scenarios in a diverse range of contexts.
You will also develop the ethical and medico-legal knowledge and research skills required for writing a master's level dissertation, and will be well prepared for further research if you so desire.
Teaching and learning
Teaching tends to defy the traditional boundaries associated with lectures and seminars.
Generally, each class in a course unit has a duration of two or three hours per week, and is split roughly between a formal, didactic period and a structured discussion period (most often based on the so-called, challenge-response model).
Nevertheless, each class is considered a seminar or lecture, and attendance of all classes of a course unit for which you are enrolled is compulsory. For course units of 15 credit value, there will generally be 15 hours of face-to-face teaching throughout the semester in which the unit is delivered, and twice that amount for 30 credit units.
Coursework and assessment
Assessment of all taught course units (to a total of 120 credits) is assessed by coursework in the form of essays totalling 4500 words for each of the compulsory 30-credit units, and 3000-word essays for each of the optional 15-credit units.
In addition, to complete the LLM, you must submit a 10,000-12,000 word dissertation by independent research (60 credits); no dissertation is required for the PGDip or PGCert. Part-time students undertake a supervised dissertation in the summer months of Year 2.
If you do not successfully complete the MA, you may be considered for the award of the Postgraduate Diploma.
If you do not successfully complete the Postgraduate Diploma, you may be considered for the award of the Postgraduate Certificate.
The awards of the MA or Postgraduate Diploma are classified according to pass, merit and distinction. The Postgraduate Certificate is awarded unclassified.
Course unit details
You will be required to complete 180 credits:
- 120 credits comprised of taught course units (each of 15 or 30 credit value);
- and an independent research element worth 60 credits. This will be a dissertation of up to 12,000 words that you will write over the summer months of the course, from May until September.
On the full-time course, the 120 taught credits can be split in one of two ways:
- 60 credits in each of the two semesters;
- or 75 credits in semester one and 45 credits in semester two.
If you are registered on the LLM Healthcare Ethics and Law course, you would need to select a majority of your optional course units from the law list (Mental Health Law and Policy; Medicine, Law and Society; Children, Medicine and the Law). Global Health Law and Bioethics can count as an ethics or law course.
Course unit list
The course unit details given below are subject to change, and are the latest example of the curriculum available on this course of study.
| Title | Code | Credit rating | Mandatory/optional |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dissertation by Independent Research | CSEP60012 | 60 | Mandatory |
| Philosophical Bioethics | CSEP60201 | 30 | Mandatory |
| Medico-Legal Problems | CSEP60211 | 30 | Mandatory |
| Research methods and methodologies for bioethics and law | CSEP60022 | 15 | Optional |
| Mental Health Law and Policy | CSEP60102 | 15 | Optional |
| Ethics & Genetics and Genomics | CSEP60192 | 15 | Optional |
| Global Health Law and Bioethics | CSEP60222 | 15 | Optional |
| Research Ethics | CSEP60312 | 15 | Optional |
| Medicine, Law and Society | CSEP60962 | 15 | Optional |
Scholarships and bursaries
The School offers a number of awards for students applying for master's study.
To find our more, please visit our master's funding opportunity search page.
What our students say
Facilities
At The University of Manchester Law School, you are supported by the first-class resources you would expect of a top law school.
In addition to the networked study spaces at the Williamson Building, you can access a specialist moot courtroom, enabling future legal minds to hone your debating skills in a realistic court setting.
You also have access to The University of Manchester Library , which houses a substantial collection of law books and periodicals, as well as texts to support you.
Disability support
Careers
Career opportunities
Successful graduates are able to progress within a wide variety of roles in the Medical, Legal and Ethical fields.
Graduates from previous years have, for example, proceeded to specialise in Medico-Legal practice and academic careers, and the degrees have enhanced the careers of health care professionals.
The University has its own dedicated Careers Service that you would have full access to as a student and for two years after you graduate. At Manchester you will have access to a number of opportunities to help boost your employability .