What Paper A tests in Clinical Psychopharmacology
Paper A is a written paper of about 150 questions (single-best-answer MCQs and extended matching items) sat over three hours, blueprinted against the RCPsych syllabus. Questions from this domain typically cover:
- Drug Classification & History
- Placebo Effect
- Compliance & Adherence
- Drug Development & RCTs
- Pharmacokinetics, Absorption Distribution Metabolism Elimination
- CYP450 System
- Pharmacogenomics
- Therapeutic Drug Monitoring
- Receptor Structure & Function
- Agonism Antagonism & Partial Agonism
- Antipsychotics, Mechanism & Side Effects
- Antidepressants, Mechanism & Side Effects
Worked example
This is a real question from the Clinical Psychopharmacology section, the kind you will see in Paper A:
Benzodiazepines exert their principal therapeutic effect by acting at which receptor?
- NMDA glutamate receptor
- Dopamine D2 receptor
- 5-HT2A receptor
- Muscarinic M1 receptor
- GABA-A receptor
How to revise this section for Paper A
Work in short, active blocks: attempt questions first, read the explanation whether right or wrong, and log the subtopics you miss. Our weakness tracker flags any subtopic where you score below 60% so you can target revision rather than re-reading everything. Anchor your reading to the recommended text (Maudsley Prescribing Guidelines (2025)) so your facts match the exam blueprint.
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See the full MRCPsych Paper A guide or browse all 14 revision sections.