Four choices, unfortunately for all of us UK applicants, is all we get in terms of applying for Medicine, if we're applying through UCAS. In my opinion it makes the process that bit more challenging, but I can understand why it's in place, as the sheer amount of medical applicants in the UK is overwhelming. However, it means that we need to choose very wisely when picking universities.
I think the first thing to consider is whether you are going to use your fifth choice. In past years, medical applicants would put down a related subject such as biomedical science as a fifth choice, that gave them the option to transfer course to medicine after a year at the university, in case they didn't get into their medicine choices. However this is something most unis are very sceptical of now, so in the course description of related courses like biomedical science it may say that the uni will automatically reject a medicine-oriented personal statement. I'm not sure how many unis this applies to, so do your research if you do want to go down this route. Another option for the fifth choice is to use it for another subject entirely, that you would like to go into as a full degree if you don't get into medicine, for example biology or chemistry. The thing with this option is the conflict with the personal statement. To have a chance of getting into medicine you must have a very focused statement that shows you are committed to the course, but with a statement so focused on medicine you are unlikely to get into a course like biology unless it is undersubscribed. Of course, I can't comment on individual unis and have not done this myself, so do your research and perhaps speak to people you know or online that have done this. If you're really set on going down this route then you need to explore both subjects subtly in your personal statement, however it's not something I would suggest - if you're thinking of taking another subject if you don't get into medicine, perhaps have a rethink about if medicine's really for you - the job involves a lot of setbacks and hard work that you really need to be committed to deal with, and the job's not something you can abandon at the first hurdle, which is why most applicants to medicine apply again the next year if they don't get in first time rather than abandoning the idea entirely. On the other hand, you might decide you want to do medicine but don't want to do a gap year and reapply again, and in that case using the fifth choice for something like genetics is advisable if you are going to commit to studying the subject throughout the next three years and THEN apply for post-graduate medicine. This option scares me a bit though - postgraduate medicine is more difficult to get into than regular medicine as there are far far fewer places, and you also have to bear in mind that the government won't fund most postgrad medicine courses.
The other fifth choice option is the one I chose, which is to not use the fifth choice at all. The OCD among us, like my mum, will have trouble adapting to this idea (trust me) as they think that you're wasting a choice, but you're really not, as if medicine is truly what you want to do, why would you want to put down another course that you're not going to take on? However this does mean that if you don't get into medicine and are committed to the idea, you have no choice but to take a gap year and apply again the next year. The idea can be quite a daunting one, but considering that only around 37% (I think that's the statistic) of applicants get in first time, it's an option that SO many people take. I know three people that have had to take a gap year, and every single one of them say that it was the best thing that could have happened. One went to work in a boarding school for a year, the other bartended in London and modelled for Hollister, and the other spent a year training as a lifeguard and first aider with the Spanish Red Cross - and every single one of them came back with a positive experience, ready to reapply. A gap year can be such a positive thing, that quite a lot of people take out of choice, so don't be disappointed if you don't get in and all of your friends are going to uni, because your gap year is what YOU make it.
Anyway - over this past week I've discovered that I am absolutely rubbish at article-writing, I go off on a tangent and ramble for too long, so the subjects I said I'd talk about are likely to be broken down into smaller parts depending on the detail I go into, sorry! This is quite a cathartic experience to be honest, it's nice to purge all of the emotions you've accumulated from the experience as a whole, and put them into giving whoever reads this the information I wish I'd have been given - you just wait until I get onto my Oxford interview, that's going to be an interesting one haha!
Bye for now!
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