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What Is Your Email Signature?


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Hi. I'm half-way through my first year in med school when I was talking to a friend who mentioned how people find the title "MD candidate" very pretentious and we shouldn't use it in our email signatures. I was shocked because I've been using it in my email since the beginning of the year AND this was the format suggested in the official first year guide package... But just in case I don't annoy future preceptors, I wanted some second opinions on this. To residents/staff, how do you feel towards the title "MD candidate?" To current medical students: What are your email signatures? Mine is as below:

 

Name Name

MD Candidate

Class of 20xx

Name of University

000-000-0000

email@email.com

 

NOTE: I ONLY USE SIGNATURES WITH FORMAL EMAILS (i.e. people from faculty, any staff from hospital/school, any professional whom I'm emailing for the FIRST time and should probably know that I'm a medical student for one reason or another.) So please don't misunderstand that I flaunt my title to my friends/family/ppl unrelated to school/work

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Just my full name and if it's my first time emailing a contact who may not otherwise know that I'm a medical student (and this knowledge is relevant) outside of me stating it once early in the body of the email, I will add "Class of 2019" on the line following my full name at the end of the email.

 

I see classmates who have signatures similar to yours or with some aspects of it and I've also heard that apparently it is discouraged to use the MD candidate terms in your signature, but ultimately I don't think anyone cares THAT much.

 

Just do whatever you feel most comfortable with and seems most reasonable to you. If you are very concerned about this and really want a more definitive answer, just ask one of the physicians in your UME office what they recommend and whether this has been an issue in the past.

 

Personally I like to keep it casual after having had a more formal signature during my previous degree and employment.

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Ditto - I never felt the need to use an email signature as a medical student (or resident, for that matter), since the first sentence of my email would explain who I was, and it's assumed that your email address is the one you are sending from. I really only find signatures useful when I need a mailing address or phone/fax number. It may be an institutional norm though, if everyone else in the class has one... 

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I also only use first name, last name. Agree with above that signatures are the most useful for contact info. I don't think anyone cares too much about whether you have "MD Candidate" under your name.

 

... The "Sent from my [insert phone here]" signature annoys me though : P

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I realize this is a bit nitpicky, but the term "candidate" is actually a thing in doctoral (PhD) degrees, and it's a title that you earn partway through the degree after completing your comps/candidacy exams. So, PhD student is a very different title than PhD candidate, and the candidate designation conveys that you've completed a specific milestone. There's no equivalent in med school - you're just a medical student for all 3 or 4 years. I have a number of friends with PhDs in progress or completed, and I know how much getting that 'candidate' designation meant to them, so I just don't like to see it tossed around out of the proper context (which is not necessarily representative of everyone's opinion, just my own). 

 

I don't think that as a medical student or resident we need a particular e-mail signature, since if we're e-mailing people professionally we'll presumably explain who we are within the body of the e-mail. If I felt like I had to be more formal, I'd write:

 

First Lastname

Medical School, Class of xxxx

 

But I fully recognize that this is my own pet peeve and can't adequately explain why it bothers me so much, haha. 

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We had a lecture about this on the first day of medical school from our faculty advisor. He said don't put candidate. The general consensus was the following:

 

First Name Last Name + highest degree obtained ( don't want to see B.Sc (Hons) M.Sc PhD certified in whatever)

Medical Student 

Class of 2019

The Medical School you attend 

 

But ya I always include mine when reaching out to faculty, physicians in the community or for research purposes. Not to fellow med students, family or friends though... 

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