03-17-2016, 05:31 AM
The personal statement is very often overlooked or left to professional writers. I really think this is a missed opportunity to convey a compelling story.
PD's are humans and have emotions too.
Try your very best to strike an emotion with the reader. Here is my advice:
1. Tell a very personal story that will be very unique to you and unforgettable e.g family struggles, issues with your country, hardship you faced while in med school. You can pick a medical condition prevalent in your region and tell a story of how you have seen people suffer and how it motivates you to be a doctor.
2. Be very emotional with your words. Show that you care about the profession and for people you want to provide your services to, talk about how passionate you are, you can use words like: I tear up, I cried, i felt very frustrated.
3. Share a short story: Try as much as you can to share a story that can make you instantly distinguishable from thousands of other applicants. An example will be a short story of how you solved a problem or challenge at some point in your medical career, how you offered a simple solution/improvised.
Remember this, a PD will forget scores, YOG or publications easily but will never forget that applicant that lost a parent to a rare cancer, was abused as a child or improvised a water filter that helped improved the lives of people in a rural area.
Scores and publications can make you look qualified but stories can connect you on a deeper level with a PD who may have shared some of your experienced.
Your ultimate goal is to get matched, once this happens, your scores become useless and your next challenge becomes the board exams.
It is your state licence that will hang on your office wall and not your USMLE score cards.
I hope this helps someone.
PD's are humans and have emotions too.
Try your very best to strike an emotion with the reader. Here is my advice:
1. Tell a very personal story that will be very unique to you and unforgettable e.g family struggles, issues with your country, hardship you faced while in med school. You can pick a medical condition prevalent in your region and tell a story of how you have seen people suffer and how it motivates you to be a doctor.
2. Be very emotional with your words. Show that you care about the profession and for people you want to provide your services to, talk about how passionate you are, you can use words like: I tear up, I cried, i felt very frustrated.
3. Share a short story: Try as much as you can to share a story that can make you instantly distinguishable from thousands of other applicants. An example will be a short story of how you solved a problem or challenge at some point in your medical career, how you offered a simple solution/improvised.
Remember this, a PD will forget scores, YOG or publications easily but will never forget that applicant that lost a parent to a rare cancer, was abused as a child or improvised a water filter that helped improved the lives of people in a rural area.
Scores and publications can make you look qualified but stories can connect you on a deeper level with a PD who may have shared some of your experienced.
Your ultimate goal is to get matched, once this happens, your scores become useless and your next challenge becomes the board exams.
It is your state licence that will hang on your office wall and not your USMLE score cards.
I hope this helps someone.