Medicine

Applications to Medical School

Only around 40% of applicants for Medicine are successful. Make sure you are one of them.

Let’s be honest: no matter how much preparation a student is given, he or she has to be an excellent candidate to be offered a place to study Medicine. Becoming a successful doctor requires many skills as well as strength in academia, and admissions staff will evaluate predicted or actual grades, performance in specialist tests, school references, the personal statement and performance at interview are all reviewed carefully before a candidate is offered a place or rejected.

How can MPW help?

MPW’s Medical School Preparation Programme covers four main areas:

Personal statement review service

Your personal statement needs to convince admissions tutors that you are worthy of an interview, which is essential because most medical schools only issue conditional offers after their admissions panel have met you. Only 15% of Medical School applicants will be invited to interview.

When you’ve finished the first draft of your personal statement, we can provide you with feedback on its strengths and weaknesses. We often list additional reading/research areas that would make the personal statement more compelling and we can give you guidance on how it might be improved.

Interview practice

Interviews enable candidates to demonstrate strengths beyond their academic ability, and to make a case if their academic profile is strong but is equalled or bettered by other applicants. At interview, you need to prove that you can:

listen effectively
absorb facts and ideas presented to you and assess their relevance
respond to problems and criticisms
present arguments in a logical, clear manner

Our experienced tutors have spent years coaching students for these crucial interviews and know how to get the best from applicants, what an admissions tutor is looking for and the key points that any student might need to improve on. Depending on the required format, panel interviews or multiple mini interviews (MMIs) are available to suit the applicant. These are held by senior staff and external experts, usually practising doctors, at MPW and last for up to 40 minutes, after which verbal feedback and a written report are provided.

All mock interview candidates are given a copy of the MPW Guide Getting into Medical School. This provides detailed, up-to-date advice and information about all aspects of Medical School admissions.

Entrance Test tuition

Most universities require applicants to sit aptitude tests as part of the application process, including the UCAT and BMAT tests. Experience shows that students can benefit from familiarity with these tests: learning the techniques required to approach questions effectively; and awareness of the sorts of questions to expect. We liaise with industry experts to provide focused tuition on the tests themselves including analysis of those trickier questions.

Dedicated lecture series

In-house experts and visiting speakers deliver a series of lunchtime lectures during the Autumn Term. These are designed to provide further information on Medicine in general, the NHS, relevant current affairs, and to provide insight into the application process.

Recent lecture topics have included:

Why Become a Doctor? – Dr S Burnett
Medical Ethics – Dr A Wilson
Interview Practice – Dr A Wilson
Your Years at Med School – Dr V Allen

The programme is also suitable for students applying to read Dentistry or Veterinary Medicine at university. All MPW students wishing to apply for any of these vocations will be automatically enrolled onto the programme, which is available to external students for a fee.

For more information

For more information about support for your Medical School application, please contact us.

Additional information and guidance is provided on the Advice section of our website and our book Getting into Medical School is available from Amazon.

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