5 Easy Ways to Start Preparing for Medical Interviews Now
7 months ago by Rob
So you’ve made it through the UCAT and now all you want to do is breathe a sigh of relief and forget about the whole medical entry process. But it’s not over yet! Medical interviews are a very important and challenging aspect of the medical entry process.
Medical interviews are worth up to 40-50% of the entry criteria for medicine, and at some universities, are the only factor used to determine whether you will be offered a place once threshold UCAT and academic scores are met. Therefore, it is vital that you prepare effectively for your medical interview. This blog describes 5 easy ways to kickstart your medical interview preparation.
1. Don't Forget UCAT Situational Judgement
The UCAT Situational Judgement section tests similar skills to the medical interview. Unlike the other parts of the UCAT exam, the Situational Judgement subtest analyses your ability to handle potentially difficult situations. This is an excellent foundation with which to begin your medical interview preparation.
Remember the types of scenarios that you came across in UCAT Situational Judgement question, and think about further questions you might be asked if the scenario was posed to you in a medical interview setting. UCAT Situational Judgement scenarios are very possible in an MMI (Multiple Mini Interview) situation in which they will be assessing your ability to respond appropriately, amongst a myriad of other skills.
For the interview, you will need to have a certain depth to your responses ranging from compassion to realism. The interviewers appreciate a reasoned argument that acknowledges all potential points of view. While the UCAT Situational Judgement subtest has much less of this depth, it does test your ability to act appropriately. It is important not to equate the medical interview with being a Situational Judgement test, however, such questions do mimic a certain style of medical interview question.
2. Read the news
The unsung aspect of numerous medical interviews is the understanding of contemporary, topical issues. In both the MMI format and the panel interview format there is a very real possibility of being asked about issues in today’s society. Interestingly, these are not necessarily related to the field of medicine. In recent years, topics have included refugees, vaccines, euthanasia, universal healthcare and freedom of speech.
Doctors are intrinsically leaders of our society; people come to learn from them, be healed by them and be comforted by them. It is an enormous amount of responsibility to be placed on any one person, yet it is simply the reality of our vocation. One of these responsibilities is to be literate in the problems facing our society and to be capable of responding appropriately with reason and compassion. So the place of ‘political’ questions in the medical interview is very pertinent.
Closer to the medical interviews you may end up doing more specific research. However, a very simple way to start your medical entry preparation early is to start reading the news and familiarising yourself with the current issues affecting our society.
3. Practice!
This is simply a fantastic idea. Perhaps it’s immodest to say so but it is such an easy way to improve that virtually no one employs. Everyone seems to forget that interviews are a very practice-able skill. Arguably the most easily practiced, in fact, of all the aspects of medical entry. Furthermore, it is highly likely that there are numerous people around you who have experience with interviews. These are resources you simply must use. Whether it be teachers, headmasters, heads of faculty or any other official in your academic, professional or even personal spheres, you will be surprised how many of them will be happy to help you.
Politely ask them if they could spare 15 minutes to do a mock medical interview. If you contact them early enough they will usually be able to find time for you, be it in a week or a month.
The benefits of doing this are enormous. Not only will you obtain great practice talking formally, in an interview format, but you will obtain useful advice on how to improve your technique, from people who may have conducted hundreds of interviews in the past. You can also access tailored, university-specific mock interviews with feedback as part of MedEntry’s interview package.
4. Look at common interview questions
If you can make time for it, start looking at interview questions early. This will prepare you well for medical interviews. You can gain access to a great quantity of quality questions from the MedEntry medical interview guide and MMI bank.
Your approach to these medical interview questions is important and should be varied. As indicated in tip 3 above you should definitely have someone ask you them in a proper medical interview situation. In addition to this, you might take notes on the major themes of these medical interview questions or simply review them and note down / reflect on how you might respond.
For panel style interviews, there are numerous medical interview questions that come up frequently. With regular exposure you can deliver a honed response that will be impressive and above the innate response of someone who has just heard the question for the first time.
For MMIs, the sub-themes of prompts are often similar and certain themes pop up every year. When looking at MMI prompts you should be considering the major themes, the types of MMI questions that might be asked, the various arguments that could be raised and how you could succinctly respond with breadth and distinction.
5. Join a medical interview training course
This serves a psychological purpose as much as an educational one. Once you have enrolled in a medical interview course, there is no longer a barrier between you and your capacity to prepare for medical interviews. Furthermore, students often leave their medical interview preparation to the last minute, however, if you have the resources at hand, you can remind yourself of the need to practice regularly.
Doing little bits of medical interview preparation regularly and starting relatively early is really quite simple and very achievable for even the hardest working student. So perhaps you can try and employ some of these tips, semi-regularly, from now on. If you do I promise that you will be more prepared than the vast majority of students for the medical interview.
Written by Jeremy, a past MedEntry student who is currently studying medicine at Monash University.
