What I learned from medical school interview

Medical school interview is an essential part of medical school application. Hence, preparing for it was crucial for me. And during the process, I have not just improved my interview skills but learned precious lessons about Australian healthcare system, Australian public health problems, medical ethics, and how to better care for others.

But firstly, what does medical school interview in Australia look like?

Generally, the interview is the last step of admission process after GAMSAT (you can read more about how I prepared for it as an NESB here) before medical schools send out offers. The interview is structured to assess different attributes that are not just important for an Australian doctor-to-be but suitable with the medical school conducting it. The medical school interview is conducted either as an MMI (multiple mini interview) or a panel interview like a job interview. However, the medical school interview is not similar to a job interview (which I will write more in future, so stay tuned!). Hence, although candidates might have experience interviewing for your jobs before, they still have to thoroughly prepare for medical school interview.

Interview format

The interview format differs from schools to schools. It can be an MMI with 6 to 8 stations with each station lasting for 8 to 10 minutes. Or it can be a panel interview where one panel will interview candidates for the whole period of 40-50 minutes. Although the format is not the same for every school, all medical schools will assess quite similar attributes such as ethical-decision making, communication skills, situation judgement, advocacy, etc… You can read more in the interviewer manual of Mc Master Uni, the inventor of MMI, here. As for the current COVID situation, most of the school will conduct online interview, and some even ask candidates to take a Situation Judgement Test, such as CASPER, and a video interview such as Snapshot. I will also write more about how I passed CASPER in future, so stay tuned!

Important role

Generally, the interview score will account for 1/3 of the final score of a candidate beside GAMSAT and GPA. University of Wollongong is a special case where it only took interview, CASPER and portfolio scores to rank candidates for offers in 2020-2021 process as you can see in the image below. So, interview can actually make or break for many candidates. It is therefore a vital part of the admission process, and candidates should prepare for it as early as possible.

So, what did I learn from preparing for medical school interview?

Precious lessons.

Although I succeeded in job interviews and worked in a hospital lab before, I still learned many precious lessons during the preparation process. Particularly, I understood more about Australian public health problems and the issues of Australian healthcare system. I learned how to think and deal with complex ethical dilemmas. I learned how to better handle difficult situations. And especially, I realised I didn’t take care of myself enough.

Australian public health problems

Australians have very high life expectancy which is 80.4 years for boys and 84.6 years for girls. But there are still public health problems (beside COVID) that a medical student needs to be aware of, such as obese and mental illness (AHIW 2018). Candidates can be beneficial if they are also aware of contemporary issues that you might find on the news such as Aged Care Royal Commission and, of course, COVID-19.

Furthermore, a medical student is a doctor in training. Hence, in my opinion, it might be a bonus point if a candidate can have a thought on these problems, reflect on their own experience and have a think about how they can help solve these problems. There might be scenario questions where, for example, candidates would be granted an amount of money to solve such public health problems. To answer these questions, candidates might need a structure, but it would be too long to mention here. So I will write about how I have approached these questions, so stay tuned!

Special issues of Australian healthcare

Despite being one of the best healthcare systems in the world, Australian healthcare system has its own noticeable problems. Putting COVID problems aside, the two substantial long-term problems are: the gaps between Indigenous Australians and non-Indigenous Australians; and the lack of healthcare workforce and resources in regional areas.

Indigenous health

Firstly, Indigenous Australians have lower life expectancy and experience more health disadvantages than non-Indigenous Australian (AIHW 2018). This is due to the bloody history of Australia where Indigenous Australians were killed and treated inhumanely as you can read more here. Furthermore, after colonisation, Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their parents, even right after they were born as you can read more about them, the Stolen Generation, here. This treatment has led to many health disadvantages for Indigenous Australians in the modern time, and it has also built up the mistrust of Indigenous people in the modern Australian healthcare system. In addition, this poor treatment still, unfortunately, happens in 21st century. There are more subtle issues relating to Aboriginal and Indigenous culture regarding Country, Land and kinship that future medical students will need to know and you can read more here.

Rural and remote health

Secondly, Australia is a vast continent with a population distributed mostly in large cities. Hence, it is not cost-effective to have large modern tertiary hospitals in rural and remote areas. Expensive medical and specialist services, such as CT scan, cardiologist and oncologist services, are also scarce in such areas. Importantly, this situation leads to the lack of support network from peers and specialty training for doctors in rural areas. And hence, the lack of doctors. As a result, patients in regional and rural areas, therefore, lack the accessibility to necessary services and suffer more health disadvantages than patients in metro areas (AHIW 2018).

These are essential issues that Australian government is trying to tackle (I also mentioned how international graduates might need to work for 10 years in rural here). Even in medical schools, I am still learning about these issues. Hence, I think that candidates might need to show their own opinions, reflections, and understandings about these important issues.

Ethics and difficult situations

Medical ethics are crucial for every medical professionals, especially doctors. They are important not only because they are a fundamental part of medicine but they provide guidance for doctors in difficult situations to avoid legal problems.

There are 4 medical ethics principles: respect for autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence and justice that you can read more here. When required to make ethical decisions, it is important for every candidate to know the four principles and how to assess the situations given. During my preparation, I practiced approaching these questions with a structure that I will write more in detail. But generally, in both types of ethical and difficult situations, the candidate might need to take into account many details, including the emotions of all stakeholders and the implications of the candidate’s further actions.

As a medical student, I still have to learn how to deal with difficult situations and how to apply medical ethics principles in my legal topics. So, I cannot emphasize enough how important it is. And I hope no one will take it lightly.

Self-care: what does it mean?

Self-care was an unfamiliar concept to me when I was doing medicine in Viet Nam. But now, it is crystal clear to me that self-care is a part of professionalism. Doctors take care of others but sometimes forget to take care of themselves. This phenomena leads to a really high rate of suicide and burnout in medicine. Hence, medical schools nowadays take it really seriously.

Self-care can just be how you keep yourself sane, motivated, and healthy. It needs not to be fancy as a vacation. It can be a walk in the morning or a good meal. Self-care can also be a good sleep, a 10-minute mediation or 30-minute working in the gym. So, it is about being aware that you’re exhausted and taking actions to get better. Reflecting on myself, I realised this is one of my weaknesses. I always take it lightly and ignore many signs of exhaustion during my time working in the lab. And after learning about this, I take better care for myself and be a better me.

To conclude

In my opinion, the earlier a candidate start preparing for interview the better they will perform and the better chance they will have. Hence, I hope this post will help you have a general idea about medical school interview in Australia. And I will write more in detail about how I prepared for it and the structures that I used. So, take care and stayed tuned!