ECFMG - EPIC

Stepwise procedure for ECFMG EPIC verification

What is EPIC?

EPIC – Electronic Portfolio of International Credentials (EPIC) offer primary-source verification of medical credentials to physicians and organizations worldwide. Term Primary Source Verification means, verifying your certificate from the organization itself who provided it to you. This is by far the best and the most secure means to ensure all the firm that your certificate is a bonafide one. GMC uses this service to ensure themselves regarding the originality of your certificate.

What is ECFMG?

ECFMG – Educational Commission for Foreign Medical Graduates, based in the USA, is a non-profit organization. EPIC is the service of ECFMG.

When do you require ECFMG EPIC verification of credentials?

At the time of GMC registration. Not required for your PLAB test or Royal  college membership exam.

When should you start this process?

As soon as possible. I would say if you have aspirations to work in the UK, do this right after obtaining your final medical graduation certificate, as this is the time-consuming process and contains a lot of things to do. Once done, it is valid for a lifetime. The benefit of doing early is, you won't have this headache later when your main focus should be on something else. When I did this, the price of credential verification was 80$, which has now increased to 90$. So doing early also has added benefit financially.

I already have ECFMG verification done before for USMLE, should I do this again?

No. If your credentials are already verified by ECFMG previously, for any other purpose besides GMC registration, you just need to create an EPIC account worth 125$. For you, just follow the steps below from No. 1 to 23.

Within around 10 business days of generating EPIC account, and also mentioning same ECFMG ID for USMLE, the verified credentials appears on MY Reports tab with No extra credentials verification charges.

Step by step Process for ECFMG EPIC Verification of Credentials

1. Obtain a full color scanned copy of your Passport

2. Obtain a full color scanned copy of your recently taken Passport Size Photograph

3. Go to the following website: https://epic.ecfmgepic.org/Registration.aspx

4. Read the instructions and requirements carefully outlined in the ‘Getting Started’ tab and then click continue.

5. Then you will land up in the ‘Biographics’ tab. Here you will be asked about your personal informations like Name, Contact Information, DOB, Birth address, National Identification Number, etc. Fill it up all carefully and then click continue.

6. Now you will reach the ‘Medical School’ tab. Here you have to put your educational status (student or graduate). Then you have to fill the information regarding your medical school like the name of your institute, your start date and end date of your medical school and the title of your medical degree. After completing this work, click continue.

7. Then you will reach ‘Medical Registration/licensure’ tab. Here you have to add all the medical authorities and councils to which you were registered. Then add ‘General medical council’ as the authority to which you are applying.

8. Now you reach the ‘Photo/Passport’ tab. This is the place where you have to upload your photo in JPEG format with the maximum file size of 2MB and your Passport in JPEG format too with the maximum file size of 2 MB. Make sure both Passport and Photo are scanned with a high-quality scanner, as this will also appear in your EIF form (which I will tell later). If your EIF form is not in good quality, it will bring complications later. Besides, you also have to put your passport issue and expiry date in this tab.

9. After you click continue, you will reach the second last page called ‘Summary’. Here you can see everything you uploaded on a single page. If anything is missing, just edit that part by clicking on the edit button.

10. Finally, you will be directed to Payment page. You can do this with International transaction enabled Credit Card or Debit Card. You have to pay 125$.

11. Now you will get the first email from online service of ECFMG right after the payment with the subject of ‘Request to Establish an EPIC Account’. Here they will confirm the payment and asks you to wait for 3 business days to establish your account.

12. In my case, after 2 days, I got the second email from ECFMG, where they sent me the temporary username for my EPIC account.

13. Then within few minutes of the above email, you will get the third email from them, where they will provide you with Temporary Password to your username.

14. Now you log in to your account with these details and change the username and password first. They will ask you for at least 5 security questions, which you should answer them even after providing your username and password each time you log in. This is just the extra step of the security requirement from ECFMG.

15. Now after completing all these procedures, you will receive the fourth email from ECFMG, saying your account has been successfully established. You will then get the EPIC Identification number in this same email.

16. You go back to your account and go into your ‘My Identity Documents’ tab. There you can see your EPIC Identification Form (EIF). You can download this form and get it certified from NotaryCam (Online Notary Service that ECFMG prefers you to use, in order to get your EIF verified).

Sample EIF form

17. You can get this Notarycam done from the website: https://www.notarycam.com/ecfmg . You should log in to this website with your EPIC Identification number and request them to verify your EIF form. You need to select what your EIF form looks like from the option provided. The fees for this are already included in your ECFMG account establishment, so you don’t have to pay it again.

18. Very soon you will get an email from one of the notary public officer from NotaryCam, saying that they are verifying your EPIC ID.

19. Then you get the second email within few minutes from NotaryCam again, where they will ask you either to book an appointment now or in some later date if you prefer. I wanted to complete this form ASAP so selected to book an appointment NOW.

20. NotaryCam will now send you the third email giving you the link to join them online. You have to click this link. If you are using your mobile, this link will lead you to download an app, which after successful the installation will automatically connect you to notary public officer that you communicated before.

21. This is the live video chat, where you have to get ready with your passport. They will ask you to show them the original passport. Then after that, they will ask you to open the photo page of your passport and place it close to the camera. After that, you will be asked your DOB. Then they will ask you to choose a digital signature which they will provide in the options. You should select any one of them and then put the date in the designated place. They will instruct you everything. Overall this process requires 3-5 minutes.

22. Now the notary public will send the notarized EIF form to the ECFMG. You just have to wait.

23. ECFMG will receive your EIF form from Notary public within few minutes and will congratulate you in successfully completing all the initial steps.

24. Now comes the second part. You have to log in to your EPIC Account and upload the credentials. Make sure, you keep the same name as in your certificate. For GMC, it's only the Final Medical Diploma (Graduation or degree certificate). Just scan the certificate and upload it in JPEG or PDF format. This will cost another 80$ (now 90$). Then you have to choose whether you want ECFMG to send this document to your medical school to verify via normal Airmail courier service or via DHL/FedEx. If you choose normal service, it’s free but you can’t track your documents. If you choose other premium services, you can track your documents online, but it will cost you an additional 30$. However, if your institute participates in electronic communication with ECFMG then you are the luckiest. It will not ask you about any courier service, rather directly sends to your institute online. Luckily, my institute was on their list.

Also, set GENERAL MEDICAL COUNCIL of the UK, as the entity to be notified again for credentials verification reports in this step.

25. After uploading credentials and completing the above stage, ECFMG will review your documents. It doesn’t specify any time period this time, but in my case took 14 days. After ECFMG completes this reviewing process, they will send your document to your medical school either via courier or via online.

26. Then you go to your Medical School and inform the admin or principal office regarding such mails from ECFMG. Some institute does it free of charge, but many asks for minimal admin charge on this process. Mine required some charges to do it, but at least I am assured with this charge that they will perform the verification on my behalf.

27. After your college receives the document they have to verify it and send back to ECFMG. The college will generally send this via normal airmail courier service. But again you cant track it. Rather do it yourself from DHL, but BE CAREFUL sender should not be you, but your Medical School. If your college participates in electronic communication, then all of these are not an issue. They will just reply to the verification request online and it's DONE.

28. At last, PHEW!!! ECFMG will say that the verification has completed and a report has been sent to GMC. The process can take anywhere between 2 weeks to 3 months. Mine got completed in 17 days.