Medical What topic should I write about for my personal statement?

[GoSpursGo]

Hello,

I have been thinking about topics for why medicine? essay for my post-bacc program. I have too many stories in my mind and I'm always biased towards stories that I like so I just want to hear any kinds of opinions about my stories or which one sounds better/moving. Thank you so much!

1. story about my life as an immigrant in a low-income family

I could talk about how our family never had a secure insurance so that we never even thought about going to hospital after we moved here. I know that it is such a privilege that none of us were severely sick enough to go to hospital, but it was like a thing for our family to say something like "always be careful because we can't go to the hospital."

However, my dad who is working in our home country almost died bc of stomach ulcer and my grandma passed away bc she refused to go to hospital. These two incidents changed my mind about necessity and importance of healthcare. Also limited access to healthcare is a huge problem.



2. story about my aunt
I was very close to her since I was baby. Before I left my home country I realized that she was being little weird (repeating the same stories everyday,, forgetting small things.. etc) but I didn't really know what was going on. 5 years after I visited my country I found that she was suffering from Alzheimer's and sent to a nursing home because of her indifferent and abusive family. She couldn't recognize me or my family.

This made me wanna visit a nursing home where I volunteered in my home country. I couldn't recognize anyone because either they were all moved to a cheaper nursing home or passed away.

later when I was volunteering at a hospital in undergrad, I helped a patient who couldn't speak English but could speak my language. She was also suffering from Alzheimer's so she couldn't recognize me every week. This lady reminded me of my aunt and motivated me to rethink about my career path.

This motivated my interest in healthcare field and wanting to devote myself for people who cannot reach for help like my aunt or people at nursing home.



I know that I have to elaborate more and develop these stories into how I want to become a doctor.. I'm not sure how I am going to end these essays yet but I want to choose a story first because I really can't decide between these two.

Honestly, write both and show them to some trusted advisors. It's really hard to tell you which one of these "hooks" is better in a vacuum because it completely depends how the whole fits together, not the individual parts.

Also, try not to agonize too much over this. The truth is that while you should certainly do your best, unless you are an outstanding writer (or a terrible one), you're likely going to land with a personal statement that is "fine." In that case, the rest of your app will likely determine if you get in or not. If you ARE an outstanding writer, then your personal statement will shine no matter which story you choose.

Finally: regardless of which story you choose, think about how that experience informs what you want your career to look like in the future. Is the story of your dad important because you want to do international medicine? Is the story about your aunt important because you want to go into geriatrics? You don’t need to say either with absolute certainty because obviously you’re very early in your career, but it sounds like the take-away of both stories is “this showed me how important healthcare is.” Which... is fine. But that’s kind of every generic personal statement.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

I like #2 better