Wondering what to expect in your interviews coming up? Read this post to find out our top tips and more!
What are they?
Medical school interviews. Widely regarded as the most difficult and intimidating part of the entire application. In most cases, this stage makes or breaks your application: you’ve done well to catch admissions’ tutors’ eye with your personal statement, have good enough past grades, and have done fairly well on the UCAT or BMAT; this stage is where they take a deep dive into you as a person: your character, your traits, and your potential. This is the point where you separate yourself from the masses and prove why YOU deserve a place at med school.
Different types of Interview
Interviews can have two structures:
- MMI (you are interviewed at several stations, each focussing on a specific area/topic, e.g. one on ethics, one on extracurricular activities, etc.)
- Panel (you’re interviewed by multiple people in one place who take turns asking you different questions, usually with one or more of them taking notes throughout the interview)
What will I be asked?
In terms of what you’ll be asked at interview, that varies drastically between each university. Here are some high-yield topics:
- Questions about you (your background, hobbies, interests, passion for medicine)
- Academic questions (based upon biology or history of medicine etc., e.g. What in your opinion is the most significant invention in medical history, etc.)
- Ethics questions (bringing up a case study or recent event in the news, and asking you about the ethical implications, or what you would do as a doctor in such a situation)
- Situational Judgement (giving you a situation and asking for your response or judgement, e.g. your consultant comes into hospital smelling of cigarettes and alcohol, what do you do in this situation?)
- Questions about the NHS (recent news, the structure of the NHS, the NHS Long Term Plan)
These are just a few of the topics that interviewers can touch upon. The type of questions that are likely to come up also vary depending on the type of interview you are given, for example in Panel interviews you’re less likely to be asked to roleplay a scenario, which is quite common in an MMI. In MMI roleplay stations, you’re given a tricky scenario (e.g., you’ve just lost a friend’s bike, or driven over your neighbour’s cat), and you have to break this bad news to them. You’re graded on your communication, for example your word choice, tone of voice, and body language.
What’s next?
In the next few articles, we’ll be taking a deep dive into MMI and Panel interviews, what each is like, how best to prepare for them, and some general interview tips and advice for both.
The Medic Collective 