Transfer from Lublin to UPJŠ Dentistry — Continue Your Degree

So you're at the Medical University of Lublin doing dentistry, and you're wondering what a transfer from Lublin to UPJŠ dentistry actually looks like. Fair question. I'm Omar, a dental student, and I've watched a bunch of people make exactly this move — Polish dental school to Košice — so let me walk you through it the way I'd explain it to a friend over coffee, not the way an agency landing page would.

The thing almost nobody online gets right is the curriculum side. Every "Poland to Slovakia" page online repeats the same generic checklist and moves on. But your whole transfer hinges on one thing almost nobody explains properly: how your Lublin subjects map onto UPJŠ's own five-year Dental Medicine plan. That overlap — not some fixed rule — decides which year you land in. So let's actually compare the two, then do the process.

The UPJŠ destination at a glance

Here is the UPJŠ side of the comparison in one card.

Lublin vs UPJŠ: the curriculum comparison that decides your year

Here's the honest side-by-side. Lublin runs a genuinely solid programme — no shade at all — but the two plans are built differently, and that matters when you transfer.

	Medical University of Lublin	UPJŠ Košice
Length	5 years / 10 semesters	5 years
Credits	300 ECTS	~300 ECTS
Degree	Lekarz Dentysta (DDS)	MDDr.
Language	English	English
Tuition (yr 1)	€10,900	€13,500
Post-grad internship	Yes (13 months)	None

Lublin's DDS is a long-cycle Master's — 10 semesters, 300 ECTS, taught in English, awarding Lekarz Dentysta (DDS). UPJŠ's Dental Medicine programme is also a five-year long-cycle degree, awarding the title MDDr. (UPJŠ moved its English dental programme to five years from the 2025/26 intake, bringing it in line with Poland, Czechia and the rest of the region — so if you see an older page claiming six years, it's out of date.) On paper the two degrees are the same length; the differences are in how each plan sequences its subjects, and that's exactly what the recognition process looks at.

Same length doesn't mean identical sequencing, though. UPJŠ orders its pre-clinical and clinical subjects its own way, so your Lublin credits don't map one-to-one — completing, say, 2 years in Lublin doesn't automatically drop you into UPJŠ year 3. UPJŠ looks subject by subject and places you where the overlap actually lands.

What UPJŠ will actually recognise from your Lublin transcript

This is where you want concrete numbers, not vibes. UPJŠ compares your curriculum to its own and recognises subjects under real, fixed rules. Here's what carries over and what doesn't:

• Only the last 10 years — a subject is recognised only if you completed it within 10 years (counted from the start of the academic year). Old first-year credits can time out.
• Only passing, graded results — UPJŠ recognises passing grades (A–E). A subject you merely "passed" (pass/fail) is recognised as "passed – E – sufficient"; a subject that UPJŠ grades by grade is only recognised if it was actually graded, not pass/fail, at Lublin.
• Same-level, same-ish programme — the subject has to come from another Faculty of Medicine/Dentistry at the same level with the same or only slightly different content, and it has to be a compulsory or compulsory-elective subject in the UPJŠ plan.
• A credit cap — UPJŠ recognises a maximum of 180 ECTS from previous studies. Above that, you're repeating regardless.
• Only unfinished studies — you cannot transfer credits from a degree you've already completed and been awarded. This is for students still mid-course — which, if you're transferring, is you.

The recognition fee itself is small — a fixed €20 — and the transfer/application side runs about €30. Nobody's getting rich off you here.

Because Slovakia and Poland have a bilateral agreement on mutual recognition of education documents, your Lublin paperwork is treated as equal for continuing your studies — no separate nostrification needed just to keep going. That removes one bureaucratic headache a lot of people worry about.

Real talk: don't expect a fixed "you'll only redo one semester." I've seen people carry over almost two years of anatomy, biochemistry and physiology cleanly, and I've seen others repeat more because a Lublin subject didn't line up with a UPJŠ compulsory. The faculty decides your entry year case-by-case — anyone promising you an exact number is guessing.

Do you sit the entrance exam? The two paths, honestly

There are two distinct official routes at UPJŠ, and people constantly blur them. Get this right:

• Recognition of subjects — this is the common route from an unfinished study. It's open to anyone who passes the UPJŠ entrance exam. You then apply for subject recognition by 15 September, submitting to the Study Department, and the faculty decides which subjects count and which year you enter.
• Regular transfer — registration straight into the same/similar programme, only for students in good standing who've met every condition to continue into the next year. You submit a signed Request for Transfer by 15 August. You cannot both apply for a regular transfer and sit the entrance exam for the same programme the same year — pick one.

So for most Lublin dentists mid-degree, yes — the entrance exam is still in play. It's not "effortless from anywhere," and I'd rather you hear that from me now than be surprised in August. The dental entrance exam is a multiple-choice test: 100 Biology + 100 Chemistry questions (200 total), scored up to 800 points over about 150 minutes, with the acceptance threshold typically around 75%. The good news: you already did all this Bio and Chem to get into Lublin, so it's revision, not learning from zero. We build UPJŠ entrance-exam flashcards specifically for this.

The transfer process, step by step

Here's the actual order of operations, start to finish:

• Get your transcript — request your list of completed subjects in English, stamped by Lublin's study office, plus the syllabuses for each subject with completion dates.
• Translate the documents — everything must be officially translated to Slovak or English. Incomplete requests get rejected outright, so don't skip a syllabus.
• Sit the entrance exam — if you're on the recognition route, pass the Bio + Chem test.
• Submit for recognition — Application for Recognition + original transcripts (with completion dates) + course syllabi + proof of payment, to the Study Department by the deadline (15 September for recognition; 15 August for a straight transfer).
• Curriculum comparison — UPJŠ compares your Lublin subjects to its five-year plan and tells you which subjects are recognised and which school year you enter.
• Registration — on acceptance you also provide a recent medical certificate (under 3 months old), passport/ID copy, high-school leaving certificate, and a certified birth certificate.

That's it. Not scary — just precise. Every claim above comes straight from UPJŠ's official transfer and recognition page, and Medently walks you through each step because a couple of our team literally did this transfer themselves.

Cost to graduation: how the two compare

Let's be real about money. Lublin's dentistry tuition is €10,900 (year 1), €11,900 (year 2), then €13,000 for years 3–5. UPJŠ Košice sits at €13,500 per year from 2025/2026, rising about €500 a year. So per year UPJŠ is a touch more — but it's the same five-year span, with no extra year of tuition to budget for.

But the cost picture flips once you look at living costs and the internship. In Košice, a university dormitory place runs roughly €80–120 a month. In Lublin, shared-apartment rooms are more like €140–300 a month. Over five years, that gap adds up and softens the tuition difference a lot. And after the degree, Poland requires a 13-month post-graduation internship plus the LDEK exam before you practise, whereas Slovakia has no post-graduate internship and no Slovak language test after graduation — so from Košice you finish clinically ready and reach licensure a full year sooner than the Polish route.

Where the MDDr. gets you: EU and UK recognition

The end goal is a license, so let's finish there. The MDDr. is EU/EEA-recognised under Directive 2005/36/EC — UPJŠ itself notes that for medical and dental doctors, EU member states are obliged to accept Slovak diplomas regardless of the language of instruction. If you're heading to Norway, that's your route to autorisasjon via Helsedirektoratet.

For the UK, be careful — dentists register with the GDC (General Dental Council), not the GMC, and it's not automatic post-Brexit. That said, the GDC recognises EEA dental qualifications listed in Annex V.3 of the Directive through a near-automatic process; that arrangement was extended for five years from early 2023, so it runs to 2028, after which it's uncertain and non-recognised applicants sit the Overseas Registration Exam (ORE) or the Licence in Dental Surgery (LDS). The MDDr. sits in that Annex, which is a genuine reason the switch de-risks your licensing path — but always check the current GDC guidance for your year.

If you want the wider picture, we've written up studying dentistry in Slovakia in English and how medical and dental transfers to European universities work. For the medicine equivalent of this exact move, there's our Poznań (PUMS) to UPJŠ transfer guide too.

If you want a human to look at your Lublin transcript and tell you which UPJŠ year you'd realistically land in, book a free call — no agency fees, ever.

FAQ

Can I transfer from the Medical University of Lublin to UPJŠ Košice for dentistry?

Yes. UPJŠ accepts dental transfers from other faculties, compares your Lublin transcript to its five-year MDDr. curriculum, recognises passing grades (A–E) from the last 10 years, and places you in the 1st or 2nd year of the programme, decided case-by-case.

Is UPJŠ dentistry 5 or 6 years?

Five years. UPJŠ moved its English-taught Dental Medicine programme to a five-year MDDr. from the 2025/26 intake, in line with Poland, Czechia and the rest of the region — so any page still claiming six years is out of date. Lublin's DDS is also five years, so the two degrees are the same length; your transfer year is decided by how your subjects overlap, not by any year gap.

Do I have to sit an entrance exam to transfer my dental studies to UPJŠ?

For the common recognition route from an unfinished study, yes — you must pass the UPJŠ entrance exam (100 Biology + 100 Chemistry questions, up to 800 points, ~75% threshold), then apply for subject recognition. A straight transfer for students in good standing is the alternative, but you can't do both for the same programme in one year.

Is there a post-graduation internship for dentists in Slovakia like in Poland?

No. Poland requires a 13-month post-graduation internship plus the LDEK exam before you practise. Slovakia has no post-graduate internship and no Slovak language test after graduation, so you finish clinically ready with the MDDr.