How to apply for medicine (MBBS)

Tell us why you want to study medicine, especially if this is a new direction for you.

A well-defined understanding of the role of a doctor is an important part of your personal statement. In your personal statement you should explain what you understand the role of a doctor to be and why you wish to train for a career in medicine.

You must clearly describe what you have done to come to this decision. Examples could include shadowing a doctor or talking to doctors. Or learning from personal or other experiences of being a patient.

In your personal statement use your experience to explain why you want to be a doctor. The rest of your statement should show that you have the characteristics, skills and values to make you a successful doctor.

Practical experience in a caring role is essential to understanding what a career in medicine involves. Getting experience in this area through work or volunteering can happen in different ways. This could be helping with community care projects or becoming involved in a more clinical setting.

You must provide examples from experiences that show the characteristics, skills and values required by a doctor. Claiming to have these attributes without providing evidence will not be enough.Active involvement in assisting underprivileged, sick, disabled, or distressed individuals is highly valuable. It can help you gain experience for a future career in caring. Other valuable experiences can involve handling demanding situations. Or going above and beyond your basic duties to assist someone at work.

If you have taken paid employment, you may use examples from your interactions with people at work. Especially if you have experience in a role involving personal interaction.

In your personal statement, you must mention how often and for how long you've been doing the described activity. You also need to say why you chose to do it, what your responsibilities were or are, and most importantly, what you've learned from it.

For example:

"During the last six months I spent one morning a week in a care home, where I took responsibility for feeding three elderly residents. I learned that it takes a long time. One of the residents would not co-operate without a lot of coaxing and another had difficulty swallowing following a stroke. I learned to feed very slowly. I can now share experiences with the families and other carers to improve the feeding experience of the residents."

In other examples you might be able to show the benefits of your intervention to the recipient. This could be progress made by a child with reading difficulties as a result of work you have done with them.

There is no value in writing something such as:

"Working in an elderly care home for six months showed me the importance of respecting each resident as an individual."

You must clearly describe how the experience taught you this lesson and how you applied it in practice. For instance, how you showed respect for residents as individuals. Be aware that we may ask for confirmation from the organisation where you gained work experience.

A career in medicine can be enormously rewarding. It can also be challenging, frustrating and distressing at times. During their career a doctor has to keep up to date with innovation, cope with uncertainty and respond rapidly to change.

You must demonstrate a healthy work-life balance in your personal statement. This will show us your capability to handle diverse and, at times, conflicting time demands. It also provides evidence of your ability to cope effectively.

You must show that you can connect with the world around you and make your own choices and decisions. This may include examples of leadership, responsibility, enterprise or ingenuity. These examples may come from activities in the community, workplace or an academic environment.

Taking part in activities like community groups, church events, sports clubs, or bands is valuable. However, it's important to show how you also relax and enjoy your free time, instead of just listing your achievements and worthy causes.

We are aware that different kinds of opportunities are open to different individuals so will look at all kinds of activities.

In your personal statement, you can earn recognition by showing how your own ideas and actions made a positive impact. This is beyond just academic accomplishments.

Examples of contributions in this category could be:

• Establishing clubs or societies
• Organising fund-raising
• Community activities
• Awards or prizes
• Evidence of achievement in a previous career

If your effort was a success, be sure to show proof of it too. For example:

"While in my final year I found many other students were interested in photography, so I set up a club that meets twice a term. I organised outside speakers and competitions to be judged by the school governors. There is now a thriving club with about 20 regular attendees."

We can only give you recognition if you write clearly about your own contribution. We'll also give you recognition if you've shown commitment outside of the academic environment in any area of interest. This might relate to charitable work as well as sport, music or hobbies.

You can show your commitment in several ways. This could include:

• Passing exams or tests, such as music grades
• Completing tough challenges. such as the Duke of Edinburgh or a similar national award
• Taking on important roles, or participating in significant events

You should use these examples to tell us how much time and effort has gone into your commitment. We need proof that the activities required an exceptional level of commitment. Without this, we cannot give extra credit. No credit will be given for simply listing interests.

A medical career requires teamwork and you need to understand the doctor's role within a healthcare team. Your personal statement should also show how you would contribute to effective teamwork. You can show examples of team-working in many different experiences, both in and out of the academic environment.

In your personal statement you must show how you have contributed to a team, either as a leader or as a member. You must provide a credible account of the outcome of your contribution to the team.

For example, you'll not gain credit for stating that you passed a Duke of Edinburgh award. But you are likely to gain credit if you can give an example of how you worked as part of a team during a Duke of Edinburgh event.

Effective communication is an essential skill for a career in medicine. You must give examples of any experience you have in communicating with different groups. You should provide an example of a task where you have been able to exhibit good communication skills.

Examples of good communication are not limited to public speaking. However, they should be from contact with people beyond your usual peer group. You'll receive the most credit if you can give a specific example of effective communication. This could be feedback or the conclusion of the communication scenario you've discussed.

We assess applications based on the quality of writing. Avoid careless mistakes in spelling, grammar, and punctuation, as they can impact your score. Be thoughtful about how you present your personal statement. Avoid unnecessary abbreviations or technical details that don't add value. For example listing the names of operations you observed during hospital shadowing. 

Please make sure you tell us if you have made any exceptional achievements or had to overcome exceptional difficulties. It is helpful if these statements are backed up by your referee.

A Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) is an interview technique used by many medical and health related schools. You'll go through short independent assessments in different stations. There are usually between six to ten.