13 Tips for Your Residency Personal Statement
Residency applicants to most specialties typically can submit applications via the Electronic Residency Application Service (ERAS) starting in September, but don’t wait until the last minute. Get cracking on those residency essays now!
Your personal statement is a vital part of your residency application. It’s where you explain why you’ve chosen your specialty and show the committee why you’re the best candidate for training. And unlike other pieces of your application (such as your letters of recommendation and your United States Medical Licensing Examination [USMLE] Step scores), your personal statement is something that you have complete control over.
Table of Contents
- 1. Don’t reuse your med school personal statement.
- 2. Do explain why you have chosen your specialty.
- 3. Don’t offer superficial or generic explanations for choosing your specialty.
- 4. Do incorporate your unique experiences and perspectives.
- 5. Don’t sound pompous or self-important.
- 6. Do emphasize your strengths with tact, grace, and illustrative examples.
- 7. Don’t send the same personal statement to every program.
- 8. Do create multiple, interchangeable versions of your personal statement.
- 9. Do tailor your essay to your top program.
- 10. Don’t use all 28,000 characters for your personal statement.
- 11. Do keep your purpose in mind.
- 12. Don’t submit without proofreading.
- 13. Do have someone else read your essay.
1. Don’t reuse your med school personal statement.
When you applied to medical school, you expressed a passion for medicine and demonstrated that you had the potential to become a successful doctor.
Now, at this point in your education, you are a doctor (or about to be one), and you need to go beyond expressing a general passion for medicine. Unless your premed school career is particularly relevant to your personal story or your specialty choice, there’s little need to explain why you originally pursued medicine. It’s much more important to demonstrate your interest in your chosen specialty. If you simply recycle your med school personal statement, your specialty decision could come across as unformed or immature.
2. Do explain why you have chosen your specialty.
Your decision to pursue a certain specialty is a personal one, and program directors want to hear about it. Did you have a mentor who helped you see dermatology in a new way? Or did you love your time in the pathology lab? What was it about delivering babies that thrilled you? Use specific examples to illustrate your story and present your distinctive experiences and perspectives.
Most importantly, where do you see yourself in the future? Will you be seeking an academic career with teaching and research opportunities? Or do you see yourself working in a private practice or community-based hospital? Is a fellowship in the cards? Make your choice unambiguous and your commitment undeniable.
3. Don’t offer superficial or generic explanations for choosing your specialty.
“Internal medicine is like solving a puzzle.”
“Family doctors serve as gatekeepers.”
“The OR just feels like home.”
Although clichés like these might help you begin to convey the appeal of your chosen specialty, they can also be the death knell for your personal statement without proper explanation.
4. Do incorporate your unique experiences and perspectives.
Use anecdotes to illustrate your story and bring your unique experiences and perspectives to life. The more examples you can give about why your chosen specialty is the specialty for you, the better.
Perhaps you truly love diagnostic challenges or helping patients navigate the healthcare system. Go beyond the superficial statement to elaborate on that complex problem you faced – and solved – during your internal medicine rotation. Or detail the time when you shepherded a family medicine patient through the maze of referrals and treatments.
Maybe you really do feel most comfortable in a surgical environment. Describe a particular experience you had there, how your people skills and your ability to stay calm under pressure came into play, and how you felt a sense of accomplishment in helping the patients in distress. Sharing the details of your experiences and supporting your explanation will elevate your reasons from a generic cliché to a specific and personal insight.
5. Don’t sound pompous or self-important.
When describing your skills, be mindful of the line between confidence and smugness. You want to sound enthusiastic and confident, but never arrogant or boastful. For example, it can be off-putting to a reader if you talk about how your work was too easy for you, that not even the residents worked as hard as you did, or that you were head and shoulders above your other classmates. Keep in mind that your readers are considering you as a potential colleague, and nobody wants to work with someone who thinks they’re more skilled than everyone else.
6. Do emphasize your strengths with tact, grace, and illustrative examples.
You’ve gained some valuable technical skills and exposure to clinical practice, but so have all your classmates. Which of your unique qualities will make your number-one residency program rank you as its number-one choice? Your personal experiences – both in medical school and outside of it – reveal more about you than your CV and USMLE Step scores.
A good way to think about this is in the context of what’s needed for your particular specialty. Will the listening skills you developed through mentoring premeds help you as a family practitioner? Have your quick reflexes – honed through years of playing piano – prepared you for the technical dexterity you’ll need in surgery? Will the teamwork skills you developed at the student-run clinic help you contribute to an obstetrics team? Select specific examples that demonstrate your strengths and make your essay come alive.
7. Don’t send the same personal statement to every program.
You’re probably applying to multiple residency programs, and the thought of tailoring each statement to each individual program is daunting. Yet each one has certain distinctions that make it unique. If your personal statement talks about how much you love research and hope to continue that pursuit during your residency training, program directors in community-based programs might not think you’re a good fit for them. On the other hand, a completely generic statement of what you’re looking for in a residency won’t appeal to anyone.
8. Do create multiple, interchangeable versions of your personal statement.
While it’s unreasonable to suggest that you write a different essay for every school, tailoring certain features in a limited number of essays can be a good strategy. For academic programs, you might have one version that emphasizes your future research interests, while your version for community-based programs omits that line and focuses on clinical opportunities. Or you might have a version for rural programs versus urban ones or for programs in your preferred geographic location versus elsewhere in the country.
ERAS allows you to save multiple versions of your statement that you can then upload to certain schools. Just be sure to give each version a unique name to keep them all straight.
9. Do tailor your essay to your top program.
Do you have a dream program – one where you’re sure you would excel? If so, it’s well worth the extra time and effort to detail exactly why you ranked it at the top of your list. This might sound like a lot of effort, but it really doesn’t take long to identify why you want to work with a specific researcher or continue learning in the place where you had a great externship. Don’t underestimate the bonus points you can earn for this approach. Tailoring your essay to a program’s specific offerings demonstrates that you’ve done your research and your interest is genuine.
10. Don’t use all 28,000 characters for your personal statement.
ERAS permits 28,000 characters for your essay. That’s approximately 7,000 words! But no residency director wants to read even close to that much. Instead, stick to a one-page essay (600-750 words) that addresses your key points. Your essay will be more effective if you stick to the point and are concise. (Tip #11 will help you accomplish that.)
11. Do keep your purpose in mind.
As you write, remember that you’re trying to land an interview, not detail every aspect of your medical school training. If you throw everything but the kitchen sink into your personal statement, your story will be generic and lack any impact. Instead, highlight the key experiences that led you to your chosen specialty, share the details that demonstrate your fit for it, and explain where you see your future contributions in this field.
12. Don’t submit without proofreading.
In their rush to submit, some applicants skip the proofreading step, only to later find a typo that they’re unable to correct. To avoid this, take a break from writing – at least a few hours, but a full day would be even better – before carefully proofreading your essay. A good strategy is to read your statement out loud. Your ear will often pick up on things your eye misses on screen, so you’ll be more likely to catch awkward phrases, repetitive sentences/ideas, and any other glitches.
13. Do have someone else read your essay.
Even if you’ve done your own quality control, your writing is so familiar to you that it’s all too easy to miss a typo or other error. You also want to ensure that your entire essay reads well, hitting the high points that are most important and striking the right tone. Getting the all-clear from another reader will give you confidence that you are ready to submit!
You’ve worked so hard to get to this point on your journey. Now that you’re ready for your next achievement, make sure you know how to present yourself to maximum advantage in your residency applications. In a hotly competitive season, you’ll want a member of Team Accepted in your corner, guiding you with expertise tailored specifically for you. Schedule a free consultation today!
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