The PreMed Example Medicine Personal Statement Library is now open!
These sample pre-medical school, pre-med, medschool personal statement examples are here for your viewing pleasure (fully anonymous). We’re hoping to add more residency personal statements in the future, including Pre-Med personal statements. If you’ve got one to add to the free library, don’t forget to contribute yours.
ERAS MEDICAL SCHOOL PERSONAL STATEMENT
My family background is essential in conveying where I have been and who I am today. I am a first-generation American and a first-generation college student. Although my parents overcame many obstacles in coming to the United States, coping with a parent dependent on my decisions at a young age has given me a strong motive for practicing medicine as a means of helping people in difficulty. My father began his battle with alcoholism after returning from the Vietnam War. I channeled my angers and fears into programs such as Students With A Purpose and D.A.R.E, which encouraged me to establish an information booth in the local mall. This allowed me to escape the reality of my father’s disease. My commitment to learn more about alcoholism was inspired by increasing the quality and duration of my father’s life. Dealing with his disease gave me strength, initiative, and ambition that drives me to pursue a career in medicine.
My search for medicine’s philosophy began eleven years ago as I volunteered in the office of Dr. L, our family practice physician. Here I learned a great deal about diseases, drugs, and patients. Dr. L’s approach to patient care impressed me; he gained his patients’ trust with qualities such as humor, knowledge, and sincerity. Incorporating these characteristics throughout medical school and life allows me to bring confidence, warmth, and security to people.
To ensure that medicine would fulfill my desire to care for and to reach out to people, I began to volunteer at various hospitals. My answer came while I was a counselor at Camp John, a summer camp for children with muscular dystrophy. My involvement with the campers provided an appreciation of how extensively medicine has developed to provide aid in combating disease and illness, as well as a realization of the advancement that medicine has yet to see. This realization served to reinforce my desire to pursue medicine. When the weeklong camp ended, I knew that medicine would encompass life, love, strength, and trust.
At the age of twenty I experienced death first-hand for the first time in my life. As a participant in a summer hospital program, I was observing emergency room procedures when an elderly man on dialysis was rushed in. He had not breathed on his own for fifteen minutes. A fourth-year medical student began CPR on the man, but after ten minutes she became exhausted and called out for someone to continue for her. I quickly jumped to the man’s chest and tried to bring his life back. After five minutes, the attending physician called “time of death.” I stopped my efforts, disappointed at not being able to save his life. This hands-on experience cemented my desire to become a doctor and showed me that I will need experience, teamwork, and knowledge to be successful. Medical school, therefore, is the next step toward my goal.
With the decision-making process in place, I attended a summer premedical enrichment program at the University of Medicine, which opened doors that I had not encountered through volunteering. Students were exposed to an 8-week course of first-year physiology; also we selected rotations in different areas of medicine as well as interacted with various speakers on different topics such as death, AIDS, HMOs, genetic diseases, and ethics. These issues did not deter me from my goal of becoming a doctor; instead, it influenced me to select a path of lifetime learning, technological advances, and demanding issues.
The field of research was new to me until I decided to participate in a yearlong independent study with my research mentor, Dr. A. My personal investigation of medicine allowed me to develop hypotheses and testing methods to reach a valid answer to my research proposal. The efforts of my research are properly documented in my Senior Honors Thesis (“Name of my Thesis Went Here”), and Dr. A plans to publish our findings in the Fall. This study is important because humans are known to have mutations in the very same calcium ion channel subunits as these mutant mice. My decision to accept this challenge was to ensure my familiarity with every aspect of medicine: from clinical preceptorships to research.
With this complete view, I feel I have a more solid understanding of the demands of a health career. My overall aim is to learn as much as I can and to give back to the profession of medicine. I hope to go beyond my personal ambitions for a successful life and to make a difference in the lives of others. Since medicine has already made a strong impact on my life, I want to continue my perseverance and dedication in medical school to develop into a proficient, caring medical practitioner.