The Ultimate UK Medical School Personal Statement Preparation Timeline

The Personal Statement is a short piece of writing, which is part of your UCAS application. You can find out more information about the Personal Statement here.

The UCAS deadline for the September 2023 entry is Saturday 15th October 2022 at 18:00 (UK time) and everything MUST be submitted by this time.

We recommend having your Personal Statement ready before this deadline to help prevent any last-minute stress. We have created a suggested timeline for the September 2023 entry.

Remember: all great things take time!

Step 1: Plan your Personal Statement (1 week)

(Monday 22nd August – Sunday 28th August 2022).

Planning your Personal Statement is essential and so a good chunk of time is needed for this process. It is best to spread your planning over a week so you can continuously add ideas to your plan each day. This way you won’t miss out on any significant bits of information.

Step 2 – Writing your Personal Statement – 2 weeks

(Monday 29th August - Sunday 11th September 2022).

Writing your Personal Statement usually takes a couple of weeks – you can break this time up and write small bits every day or larger chunks every few days – it’s completely up to you! It’s important your first draft includes all of the important information you want to tell medical schools.

Step 3 – Gathering Feedback – 3 weeks

(Monday 12th September – Sunday 2nd October 2022).

The most important stage!

Gathering feedback can take quite a lot of time so that’s why we suggest at least 3 weeks for this stage. Generally, the people you send your draft Personal Statement to won’t be able to look at it straight away and may take a few days (or even weeks) to send it back to you. It’s better to prepare for this! You can also use this time to review the feedback and make any changes too.

Step 4 – Personal Statement Ready!

(Monday 3rd October 2022).

It’s good to have your personal statement ready well ahead of time so you’re not doing any last-minute stress-writing or panicking about getting feedback in time for the deadline. This also gives you nearly 2 weeks before the deadline to ‘sit on’ your finalised copy and make sure you’re 100% happy with the wording!

Who can help me with my personal statement?

Sign up to our 2-hour Medicine Personal Statement Workshop to get started!

If you would like a more focused approach, we offer 1-1 tutoring on your Personal Statement.

Getting feedback on your Personal Statement is very important! Have your friends and family read over it for you. And have your finished Personal Statement reviewed by one of our expert team – you can pick between a medical student review or a doctor review!