Medical School Interviews

The Medical School Interview: Preparing for the Traditional One-on-One Interview

Begin preparing for your interview by thinking through your most meaningful experiences that will help demonstrate your skills and abilities in the areas of critical and creative thinking, problem solving, leadership, teamwork, and empathy, as well as those that reinforced your commitment to the study of medicine. As with your personal statement and secondary essays, you’ll want to show the reader your strengths and potential through specific examples, rather than limiting your content to claims.  

Below, we’ve compiled a list of common interview questions, by type, to help you with your preparation. 

Know yourself. This interview is about giving the admissions committee a view into who you are. They will be looking for you to demonstrate confidence and fortitude, but also authenticity, humility, and the ability to overcome adversity.

  • Tell me about yourself. You’ll want to prepare an elevator pitch (three minutes) that provides an overview of your background and interest in medical school. What were the three most meaningful experiences that reinforced your commitment to the study of medicine?  Why? Are there specific experiences that prompted an evolution in your perspective so notable you want to include them here too? What led you to make certain academic and professional decisions? 

  • Why Medicine? Your response to this question should demonstrate your understanding of and interest in a career as a physician (rather than as a nurse or physician’s assistant, for example). In other words, it should be more specific than wanting to help people, or having an interest in patient care. You’ll want to highlight key experiences in the areas of critical thinking, problem solving, research, or leadership in a clinical environment. Prepare also for related questions such as: Is there anything that makes you hesitate about going into medicine? What challenges do you expect to face in medical school and later in practice? 

  • What has been your most meaningful research experience to date? Why? Prepare to speak confidently on any of the experiences you have listed in your application materials, particularly those in the clinical or research category. What did the experience teach you about yourself? How did it challenge you? How did the experience reinforce your interest in pursuing medical school? How did it change or reinforce your views of patient care?

  • Would you change anything about your undergraduate education? Why? 

    • If there is a red flag pertaining to your undergraduate education (for example, a semester with a low GPA or a transfer between schools), this may present a good opportunity to address it.  Without making excuses, emphasize what you learned from the experience and/or point to other areas of your academic record that are much more indicative of your ability to compete in a rigorous academic environment. 

    • If you do not have a red flag to address, you may want to talk about that missed opportunity to study abroad or take a class in medical ethics. Did an early disappointment ultimately inspire you to take part in a clinical role abroad after you graduated? Be sure to link your chosen topic to qualities related to your medical school candidacy. 

Understand your fit with the school. You must prove to your interviewer that you know about their program and are confident you would be a great fit. 

  • Why [specific school]? Look at the mission of the school, student organizations, courses, faculty, key areas of research, and come to the interview prepared to explain how you would engage with their offerings. Beyond this, keep in mind that medical schools are integrated in their local communities, so consider your fit here too. Do you have experience, for example, working in a rural (or urban) hospital? Did it impact your decision to apply to this program? Why?

Share stories. Use stories from your life to show your interviewer who you are, how you’ve grown, and what you will bring to the incoming class. Spend some time brainstorming and reviewing anecdotes that can be tailored to different behavioral questions and demonstrate the qualities medical school admissions committees are looking for. 

  • Tell me about a time when you challenged the group consensus? For a situation-based question, use the SAR (Situation, Action, Response) model. Spend about 20 percent of your response on the situation, and the remaining 80 percent on the actions you took and what resulted/what you learned. The SAR model applies to a question like: What is your greatest weakness?  You will want to spend 20 percent of your response on the weakness, and 80 percent discussing the actions you took/are taking to improve and what the results have been/what you’ve learned since beginning your improvement plan.

  • What is your greatest strength? How would you sum up your leadership style?  For questions where a simple claim would seem to suffice for a response, always take it a step further. Make a claim, THEN back it up with a specific example to illustrate that claim in action—in a group project, clinical experience, or research role.

Related:

The Medical School Interview

Your medical school interview will be the most influential component of your application. It is your chance to showcase your personality, drive, and commitment to a medical career as well as those characteristics that will benefit your medical school class and future patients.

Scheduling the Interview

Most medical schools have rolling admissions so we recommend scheduling your interview as early as possible in the interview season, which runs from the fall to the spring. Before solidifying your travel plans, you should also contact nearby schools to which you’ve applied and let them know you have an interview in the area in case they have availability. This serves the dual purpose of letting the other school know that you are “in demand,” while also showcasing your strong interest in their program.

What are the Interviewers Looking for?

Most medical schools will offer prospective students one or two 30-minute interviews with faculty members or students. The interviewers are looking to assess your interpersonal traits, commitment to and aptitude for medicine, potential contributions to the school/community, and to discuss and resolve any red flags in your academic and/or professional record. They will also want to ensure that your interview is consistent with your application.

Interview Types

The Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) 

The MMI is growing in popularity within the United States and consists of multiple “stations” through which each applicant rotates. At each station, you are given a scenario, asked to role-play, or asked to do a team exercise. You are provided a couple of minutes to read each exercise and prepare, then you must have a discussion with the interviewers and/or perform the team task. 

The scenarios are designed to evaluate your ability to critically assess a situation under pressure by presenting a dilemma to which you must respond. Be sure to carefully consider the various sides of the issue and address them all. Role playing exercises specifically evaluate your communication skills, while team tasks assess your leadership and collaboration potential. Some stations may be clinically based while others are not. 

The Traditional One-on-One Interview 

This interview type is the most common and focuses on behavioral-style interview questions such as: 

  • Tell me about yourself.

  • Why School X?

  • Talk to me about a time that you challenged the group consensus. 

  • What has been your most meaningful clinical experience to date?  Why? 

  • What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses?

  • Tell me about your biggest failure.

In an “Open File” interview, the interviewer will have access to your submission materials, but don’t assume that your interviewer knows anything about you as he/she may not have had time to review your file. In a “Closed File” interview, the interviewer will have limited access to your application. 

The Group Interview 

This situation involves several interviewers and interviewees. The objective is to see how you interact with and respond to others. Be sure to listen attentively to everyone’s answers and showcase your ability to be a team player. 

The Panel Interview 

Typically, the panel includes multiple interviewers with just one interviewee. Their questions will likely be a mix of MMI-style and behavioral-style.

Apply Point’s Tips for Success

  • Outline the key points and experiences you would like to discuss within the behavioral interview and take responsibility for bringing up these points. It is most helpful to review all of your application materials again, and highlight those stories that will showcase your abilities and strengths in the areas of leadership, problem solving, teamwork, and empathy, as well as those experiences that reinforced your commitment to the study of medicine. 

  • Nearly every response to a behavioral interview question should have a story, even those that don’t ask you to recall a specific situation—Questions such as: What is your greatest strength?  Or what is your leadership style? Give one or two strengths, and then tell a story that will SHOW the interviewer that strength in action on a group project. A good story woven into every response will make your interview more compelling and memorable to the interviewer. 

  • Speak about any recent accomplishments or events not included in your application. Continue to improve your candidacy even after you’ve submitted your application.

  • Be proactive about bringing up red flags or weaknesses in your application. Address these head-on during the interview because they will inevitably come up within the admissions committee’s discussions. Rather than make excuses, talk about what you’ve learned and how you will continue to improve moving forward.

  • Practice delivering your responses to interview questions aloud, and be sure to limit most responses (to behavioral interview questions) to between two and three minutes. Ask us for a list of MMI and behavioral interview questions so you can practice and prepare for both types. 

  • At the end of the interview, thank your interviewer, reiterate to them if their program is your first choice, and send a hand-written thank you note.

Related:

  

Tips for a Successful Virtual Interview

According to the AAMC, medical students should still expect some virtual interviews this year. There are obvious pros to this format—reduced travel costs, scheduling flexibility, and the comforts of home—but in order to connect most meaningfully through a computer and make a lasting impression, you will likely need some additional preparation. 

HBR published a piece last year on succeeding in the virtual interview, which was written by Ben Laker, Will Godley, Selin Kudret, and Rita Trehan. They spent hours watching remote job interviews and reviewing the data to determine what drives success in a virtual interview. We’ve summarized their findings below. 

Ensure that the technology enables connection, not distraction. 

  • Background: Opt for a clean, uncluttered space or select an unobtrusive virtual background. The HBR authors found that unconscious bias was less likely to appear when interviewees used a plain virtual background (forget the beach, mountains, or the Golden Gate bridge). 

  • Lighting: Place a light in front of you so that your face is clearly visible on the screen (backlighting will result in shadows). Take a test run with a friend or family member around the same time of day as your interview to confirm that they are able to see you clearly (this will ensure any natural light in the room isn’t casting shadows).

  • Bandwidth/connection: If possible, ask others in your home to log out of any high-bandwidth activities during the time of your interview, or consider hardwiring your computer into the internet. You may also want to perform an internet speed test (you can find via google).

Prepare yourself for glitches. 

  • Understand the platform that you’ll be using; if it’s new to you, download the platform and practice with a friend or family member to gain some comfort prior to your interview. 

  • Make your notes available, but don’t depend on them. Interviews—virtual or face-to-face—are dependent on connection, which gets lost if you’re buried in your notes. Ensure that your notes provide only key words (in large font) that are well organized (e.g., Why XXX Medical School, research experiences, clinical experiences, etc.). Don’t allow yourself to rifle through papers at the expense of eye contact, responsiveness, and active listening. 

  • Stay calm. If there’s a glitch, or a question that you need to think about, ask for a few seconds to think or take a sip of water. Collect yourself and present your answer when you’re ready, rather than feeling the need to launch into a response prior to gathering your thoughts.

Practice both your interview responses and presentation.

  • Note your pace. When nerves hit, people tend to speak more quickly. Practice providing your responses out loud in a steady cadence. While you don’t want to overcorrect and speak too slowly, you will want to ensure that you’re not rushing through the response and leaving your interviewer scrambling to understand what you’re saying. 

  • Use hand gestures (and don’t cross your arms). The HBR article notes that hand gestures can make you appear more trustworthy and the authors’ study found that 89 percent of successful interviewees used hand gestures to emphasize big points. 

  • Promote connection through eye contact. Look into the camera instead of at your own reflection. You may want to turn off the video mirroring capability (only after you’ve done a practice run so that you’ve confirmed that your lighting and position work well).

Finally, remember that an interview is about making a connection with another person. The interviewer wants to know you, to understand the person and personality behind your application. While you want to present yourself in the best light, a successful interview is not about coming across as flawless. Rather it is about allowing the interviewer visibility into your personality and character, and demonstrating the qualities that will make you a successful student and medical provider. The more you can focus on the interview as a point of connection, instead of a test to pass, the better your odds of success.

Related:

Medical Schools Called to Increase Diversity as Pandemic Highlights Racial Disparities in Healthcare

Glaring disparities in health outcomes by race, of those individuals diagnosed with COVID-19, have prompted providers and administrators to look at how structural racism has taken root within health education, training, and practice.

Late last month, The Atlantic published an article, Five Ways the Health-Care System Can Stop Amplifying Racism. While the article describes a complex system, including the inner-workings of hospitals, government, and insurance companies, it directly advocates for medical schools, and other provider training programs, to increase diversity in their student bodies and create a curriculum that addresses existing bias and racism, common in medical practice.

Medical schools have long sought to increase diversity, as diversity in providers means significant improvement in patient outcomes—A study out of Oakland, CA showed black doctors’ involvement with black patients increased preventive care and reduced the cardiovascular mortality gap between black and white men by 19 percent. Another study of black newborns in Florida showed that the newborns treated by black physicians had a mortality rate that was half that of babies cared for by non-black physicians.

But the number of minorities in medical school has remained low. A congressional report released last month by Democrats on the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, reported that as of 2019, only 5.8 percent of physicians identified as Hispanic, 5 percent as Black or African American, 0.3 percent as American Indian or Alaskan Native, and 0.1 percent as Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander. Further, among 2019 medical school graduates, 5.3 percent were Hispanic or Latino, 6.2 percent were Black, 0.2 percent were American Indian or Alaskan Native, and 0.1 percent were Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander.

Why? Perhaps it is because there are barriers to medical education: substantial costs, the time and attention required to prep for and take the MCAT, apply to medical schools, travel to interviews, as well as a hostile learning environment. A report released early this year found that underrepresented minorities, including Hispanic, Black, and Native American students, were more likely to experience bullying or harassment during medical training than white students at 38 percent and 24 percent respectively.

Providing medical students with a curriculum that exposes bias and the roots of structural racism is vital. The Atlantic article points out that, “To this day, medical textbooks still depict mostly white skin tones. Many medical students hold empirically false beliefs about race-based physiological differences—including the notion that black patients have a higher tolerance for pain than white patients. These beliefs affect the kind of decisions that doctors make.” 

While people can change over time, schools must proactively work to diminish racism in future doctors. This summer, a team of professors at Yale Medical School published an article in the Journal of General Internal Medicine that proposed schools seek to filter out racist applicants and withhold admittance. While acknowledging the difficulty of evaluating racist attitudes, the professors suggest using additional essays, interview scenarios, and evaluative questionnaires to adequately provide admissions teams insight into where an applicant falls on a “continuum of racial attitudes.”

Medical Schools Limited on Use of Race in Admissions Decisions but Still Seek to Promote Diversity

Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. Education Department is requiring the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center medical school to discontinue its practice of factoring race into its admissions decisions. The medical school agreed to a deal with the Education Department in order to end the long-running federal investigation into its use of affirmative action. In 2003, after the Supreme Court ruled that race was admissible as a factor in admissions decisions in Grutter v. Bollinger, the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center resumed use of race as a criteria in admissions decisions. In 2004, the Center for Equal Opportunity filed a complaint against the school, and the next year the Education Department began the investigation, which this agreement concludes.

Texas Tech had previously ceased using its affirmative action policy for admissions in the pharmacy school in 2008 and for undergraduate programs in 2013. However, the medical school contended that, “It must continue weighing race in its admissions process because a cohort of doctors from different backgrounds could best serve Texas’ racially and ethnically diverse communities.” However, the recently signed agreement stipulated that the school was not providing an annual review of the necessity of race-based admissions and therefore could not rule out that other factors may provide similar diversity-levels. The agreement also suggested that the medical school use other “race-neutral factors” to meet diversity aims, “such as recruiting students from low-income areas and favoring bilingual or first-generation college students.”

Earlier this week and just following news of this agreement, Kaplan Test Prep released survey results showing that 80 percent of 245 pre-med students surveyed in January 2019 say that “It’s important for the American medical profession to be more demographically representative of the general patient population.” Among the students who agreed with this statement, one commented, “While it is certainly possible to be empathetic and ‘tuned in’ to your patients despite differences in language, culture, etc., it is important for patients to feel like they can relate to and trust their clinician…If American clinicians were more demographically representative of the population as a whole, patients would likely find it easier to connect with a care provider they are most comfortable with.” Those in the 20 percent who did not agree with the statement were more likely to focus on the importance of drive and technical ability in becoming an effective doctor.

Additionally, an earlier Kaplan study with medical school admissions officers showed that many felt competent with their school’s diversity efforts. When the admissions officers were asked to grade his/her medical school on diversity, the majority gave themselves a B (35 percent) or C (34 percent), while fewer rewarded themselves with an A (18 percent) and even fewer a D or F (5 percent).

While it is clear that prospective medical students and doctors see the value in diversity in medical school admissions, the process by which the schools will implement these diversity goals is changing based on the views of the current administration. And these changes should be noted, especially by prospective medical students.

For future applicants: Overall, it is wise to seek experiences that improve your ability to work with others, particularly those unlike yourself. And throughout your application, you will want to speak to these experiences in a manner that showcases your commitment to serving a diverse population of patients, highlights areas where you will bring diversity into the program, and show how you have thrived and what you have learned in diverse environments in the past.

As Physician Demand Will Continue to Outpace Supply, Medical School Admissions Committees are Particularly Interested in Applicants Committed to Practicing Primary Care in Underserved Locations

The AAMC recently published updated results of its physician workforce analysis, which modeled physician demand and supply to project the needs of the 2030 workforce. The analysis shows that physician demand will continue to outpace supply, which will lead to a physician shortage of between 42,600 and 121,300 full time equivalencies (FTEs) by 2030.

Within primary care, the shortage is projected to fall between 14,800 and 49,300 physicians, which incorporates various assumptions about the supply and partnership of Advanced Practice Registered Nurses and Physicians Assistants in the future, as well as the current estimated need for 13,800 physicians to reconcile the primary care shortage from currently designated shortage areas.

Projections for non-primary care specialties, including medical, surgical and other specialties, show an estimated shortage of between 33,800 and 72,700 physicians. The greatest projected gap is for surgeons, which is between 20,700 and 30,500 by 2030. While the supply of surgeons is projected to stay steady over time, the demand is expected to increase. “Other” specialties, which include emergency medicine, anesthesiology, psychiatry, radiology, and others, has a projected gap of between 18,600 and 31,800.

The main driver behind the increasing demand for physicians is the growing and aging U.S. population. Between 2016 and 2030, “the U.S. population is projected to grow about 11 percent, from about 324 million to 359 million. The population under age 18 is projected to grow by 3 percent; the population aged 65 and older is projected to grow by 50 percent; and the population aged 75 and older is projected to grow by 69 percent.”[i] Similarly, on the supply side, the aging population of physicians and their associated retirement decisions will impact the severity of the gap. “More than one-third of all currently active physicians will be 65 or older within the next decade. Physicians aged 65 and older account for 13.5 percent of the active workforce, and those between the ages of 55 and 64 make up nearly 27.2 percent of the active workforce.” [ii] Physicians’ weekly working hours are also currently trending downward across all physician age groups.

The report also modeled access to care, which is another factor that may impact demand in the future. There are currently inequities in access to care based on geographic, economic and sociodemographic factors. While projected physician shortages based on these factors was not included in the long-term projection estimates, the 2016 models show that if the country commits to improving access to care for disenfranchised groups, the demand for physicians will be drastically increased.

The AAMC is currently advocating for a multipronged approach to address the physician shortage including the improved use of technology, team-based care, and delivery innovations, as well as the increase of federal funding for additional residency positions. The AAMC is clear that the U.S. government needs to act in the short-term to expand graduate medical education to address the long-term physician demand identified in the report, as physician training is a ten-year process. Federal funding for residency positions has not been expanded since the 1997 Balanced Budget Act. While there have been two pieces of legislation recently introduced (explained below), which would provide funding for additional residency spots,[iii] neither have gained much traction since introduction.

  • The Resident Physician Shortage Reduction Act of 2017 provides comprehensive reform to federal funding for graduate medical education.
  • Lifts the funding cap placed on the number of residents and fellows funded by Medicare
  • Adds an additional 3,000 federally-supported residency positions each year for the next five years
  • The Opioid Workforce Act of 2018 specifically targets and funds residency training for areas of critical need.
  • Adds an additional 1,000 federally-supported resident positions over the next five years in hospitals that have, or are establishing, programs in addiction medicine, addiction psychiatry, or pain management

Prospective and current medical students should familiarize themselves with this report, especially when considering their future fields of study.  Many medical schools are echoing the demand for students interested in primary care, as well as those committed to working in rural or otherwise underserved locations; In 2017, the AAMC reports that nearly 30% of those entering medical school plan to work in an underserved area. Additionally, these topics are likely to come up in interviews and at networking events.  

The AAMC has committed to updating the projections on an annual basis and makes the report available online.

The final report for 2018 created by IHS Markit Ltd for the AAMC is available here: https://aamc-black.global.ssl.fastly.net/production/media/filer_public/85/d7/85d7b689-f417-4ef0-97fb-ecc129836829/aamc_2018_workforce_projections_update_april_11_2018.pdf

 

[i] https://aamc-black.global.ssl.fastly.net/production/media/filer_public/85/d7/85d7b689-f417-4ef0-97fb-ecc129836829/aamc_2018_workforce_projections_update_april_11_2018.pdf

[ii] https://aamc-black.global.ssl.fastly.net/production/media/filer_public/85/d7/85d7b689-f417-4ef0-97fb-ecc129836829/aamc_2018_workforce_projections_update_april_11_2018.pdf

[iii] https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucejapsen/2018/05/17/congressional-bill-would-add-1000-doctors-to-fight-opioid-addiction/#60926102684a

 

The Multiple Mini Interview: Preparation and Day-of Tips for Success

Each year, an increasing number of U.S. medical schools are using the Multiple Mini Interview, an interview type focused on obtaining a deeper understanding of how a student processes information under pressure and uses critical thinking skills to derive an answer. The unique format allows prospective students multiple opportunities to make a “first impression” and reduces interviewer bias because of the recurrence of opportunities for a student to think through and address various types of questions.   

Multiple Mini Interviews typically consist of between four and ten interview stations, some with rest stations included in between. At the stations, interviewees are provided with a question prompt and a couple of minutes to think through the situation, then they’re asked to respond within a five to eight-minute period. The requested response could take various forms including collaborating with other prospective students, acting out a scenario, responding to an ethical or policy scenario, writing an essay, or providing a behavioral interview response. Whatever the format, applicants’ responses must showcase critical thinking skills, strong sense of ethics, and ability to see multiple viewpoints.

Preparation for the MMI should be focused on increasing your comfort level in reading a prompt and analyzing the question quickly so that you can articulate a thorough and comprehensive response. The MMI does not aim to assess your knowledge of specific topic areas, but rather is a format designed to extract a more genuine version of you.

We recommend you consider the following as you prepare for the interview:

  • Don’t forget the goal. As you practice your MMI responses, be sure that you’re integrating qualities into your answers that demonstrate intellectual curiosity, empathy, humility, professionalism, commitment to medicine and research, and tenacity. MMI questions are designed to reveal an authentic version of you, so as you prepare, make sure that you’re highlighting those qualities that will make you an excellent medical student and doctor.
  • Get current. Familiarize yourself with policy and ethical issues in healthcare by reading about current events. Write down key topic areas you encounter frequently and take informed positions. Practice describing your position, out loud, with an eight-minute time limit.
  • Practice your pace. If possible, participate in mock MMI interviews to get a more realistic interview experience and gather candid feedback. If you do not have someone to provide a mock interview, review sample MMI questions and record and time your responses. Critique your responses, focusing on how well you verbalized your thought process and supported your viewpoint, as well as, how adequately you made use of the time available. While this exercise may feel uncomfortable at first, it will be helpful to get used to working within the time constraints of the interview.  And viewing a recording will help you to hear/see what improvements you need to make.

On the day of the interview:

  • Read each prompt carefully and think through all aspects of the response. If the question allows you to make a counter-argument, do so, and share why you opted for the conclusion you did. If it is an ethical or values-based question, be sure to point out areas of nuance.
  • Make eye contact, look friendly, speak clearly and use every station as an opportunity to showcase your professionalism. If you start to stumble or get frustrated, take a deep breath or sip of water and compose yourself before continuing.
  • Use your time carefully; during the two minutes of preparatory time, outline your response and the general timing you’d like to abide by to make each of your key points.
  • Start fresh at each station; regardless of how well or poorly you did in the last mini interview, leave it behind and focus entirely on the prompt at hand.
  • For introverts, the MMI can be particularly challenging. Be sure to give yourself some quiet time prior to the MMI to gather your energy.

Your story set apart.