Application Advice

Jan 30 2018

45 common medical school interview questions

List of common medical school interview questions

Hey Pre-Meds! Here is a list of some common medical school interview questions! This list will be updated from time to time with more questions, so make sure you are subscribed to our newsletter to hear when that happens. I also included these questions in a word document that you can type your answers into. Download now! Best of luck with your interviews!

Download word document version

Questions:

Tell me about yourself?

Why did you choose your major? What do you like about your major?

Why do you want to pursue a career in medicine?

Describe a challenge that you have overcome. How does that experience relate to what kind of physician you would be?

What inspired you to become a doctor?

Why become a doctor instead of becoming a nurse, PA, or other medical practitioner?

Why our medical school?

What do you like most about our medical school?

What will you do if you aren’t accepted to medical school?

What other career would you consider if not medicine?

What do you believe makes you unique from other applicants?

What are your two biggest strengths? How will these help you be a good doctor?

What are your two biggest weaknesses? How will overcome them?

What will you contribute to the learning environment of your class?

Why are you a good fit for our medical school?

What do you think will be your greatest challenge in completing medical school or learning how to be a doctor? How will you address it?

What do you believe is the most pressing problem in medicine today?

How do you plan on paying for medical school?

If you were accepted to multiple schools, how would you make your decision?

What makes you most excited about being a doctor?

What are your hobbies?

Why would you be a good doctor?

What do you feel are the most important qualities in being a good doctor?

How would you handle working with a difficult colleague?

What exposure have you had to the medical profession? How has this impacted your decision to pursue a career in medicine?

What are your most memorable clinical experiences?

What lessons did you learn from your volunteer work?

What is your most memorable volunteer experience? Why?

What do you think you will like most about practicing medicine?

What do you think you will like least about practicing medicine?

What are three things you want to change about yourself? How will you go about making those changes?

What is your favorite subject? Why?

What aspect of medical school do you think you will find most challenging? How will you address that?

How would you describe the relationship between science and medicine?

Where do you see yourself in 10 years?

Why do you think you will be successful in coping with the pressure of medical school?

Who has most influenced your life so far and why?

Some people say that doctors make too much money. What do you think?

What do you think about [insert topic on ethical issues in health care]?

What do you think about [insert current policy issue in the US healthcare system]?

How does your research experience relate to a field in medicine?

What type of physician do you want to be? Why?

What was the hardest class you took in undergraduate? Why?

What were the main lessons you learned from undergraduate that will help you handle the rigor of medical school?

As an applicant what do you think your greatest strengths and weaknesses are?

Check out this other article about preparing for a medical school interview:

Seven keys to being ready for your medical school interview

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Aug 01 2017

9 Tips to write a personal statement that captivates your reader. (Medical School essay)

Nine Tips to write a personal statement that captivates your reader

The personal statement is one of the most important aspects of your medical school application and one of your best opportunities to separate yourself from other applicants. Your personal statement is your chance to convince medical schools that you would be a great physician. Do not underestimate the value of having a good personal statement. There are many medical schools that accept students who don’t have the highest GPA or MCAT, but have excellent personal statements. And it is often the personal statement that plays a major role in encouraging the medical school to invite you to an interview. Please take your time to review the tips I wrote down below, these tips come from personal experience as well as advice from medical school admission officers. So what are some tips to help you write a spectacular medical school essay that no school can resist?

1.Treat the essay as if you are writing a novel. Tell a story.

One of the most important things you can do when writing a personal statement is to write it as if it were a novel. You want to start the essay strong with something that catches the readers attention, use suspense, build up to major events, and give the reader closure at the end. It is important that you are able to maintain the readers interest in your story.

2. Use powerful language.

An easy way to improve your essay is to use strong and emotionally powerful adjectives. When describing events use metaphors. You want all of the language that you use to really leave an impression. This ties in with the first tip about writing a novel, you really want to use strong and symbolic language that will captivate your reader.

3. Make a list of several key points and themes you want your personal statement to include

This also goes back to the idea of writing a story and is honestly one of the best ways you can guarantee you say everything you want to and give the right impression to your reader. By having themes and key points in your essay you are both implicitly and explicitly emphasizing why you would be a great addition to their medical school program. Make a list of all of the major points you want to emphasize and the main themes that will define your essay. This list will be a valuable asset as you write your essay.

Heres a list of some things you might want to focus on: Showing you really care about helping other people, illustrating your hands on experience with patients, showing that you love to volunteer, showing all the different struggles you have overcome and how you have grown from them, showing your growth and evolution as a person over time, showing that you understand the rigors and realities of medicine, showing strong and resilient character, and showing that you are humble.

4. Make sure to subtly repeat your key points and themes throughout your personal statement

It is important to be able to subtly remind your reader of your key points as you write your essay. You want to be able to tell them that you are awesome without having to say it directly. Having consistency in your key points and themes makes it more authentic. For example: If you want to get the key point across that you have learned a lot from patient interaction, mention in the beginning of the essay how one patient was memorable to you. And then later in the essay bring up how the lessons you learned from that patient played in an impact in a separate situation. Once your essay is able to show consistency in your key points they become themes of your essay. And having a theme is much more powerful than trying to tell your reader explicitly why you are awesome. Being consistent and subtly repeating your key points and themes makes your essay more genuine.

5. Give examples for your claims

Having examples for each of your key points will greatly increase how believable your essay is and also the impact it leaves on your reader. Make sure you have good examples for your key points. Also make sure to use strong and emotional language, see tip #2, when describing that example. For example: If you are trying to show your reader that you are compassionate for others, then have an example where it shows you are compassionate.

6. Stay humble.

This is one of the most common pitfalls that many pre-med students fall into. Many medical school admission officers emphasize the importance of being modest and humble when writing your personal statement. Often one of the biggest turn off’s to medical school is being too full of yourself. That is why it is best to imply rather than directly state that you are good at something. Remember, being subtle and consistent is key.

7. Make sure not to go over the character limit

This one is actually really important for saving you lots of time and annoyance. The character limit is only 5300 characters! That is only about one page long. When I wrote my essay I accidentally misread it as 5300 words! That was a big mistake. Because when I copied my essay into the AMCAS essay box, it was literally twice as long. Then I had to go back and try and cut certain things out to make it fit. It was a very painful and upsetting process. So make sure you are constantly checking that you don’t go over the character limit. If it helps, you should write the essay in the essay box instead of a word processor.

8. Don’t have any grammar mistakes

This is an obvious one but also one that is easy to avoid. Having grammar mistakes is one of the easiest ways to show a lack of professionalism. So just make sure to double-check that.

9. Have multiple people proofread your essay and give feedback

This tip is a must. It is critical that you get other people’s opinion on your essay. Other people will see things that you won’t and have advice that you wouldn’t have ever considered. You will most likely have to go through several drafts of your essay before it is truly ready. I went through 6 drafts before I submitted my essay.

Follow these tips and you will have an essay that truly stands out and makes medical schools interested in you. The main key points to take from this article is: Write a story that will captivate your reader and keeps their attention, develop major themes and key points that your essay is based around, and to have others check your essay. Remember, the personal statement is your biggest opportunity to let you stand out. Write a powerful essay that will blow the socks off your reader! I believe in you! You can do this!

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May 13 2016

How a Pre Med should spend summer to boost their medical school application

How a Pre Med should spend summer to boost their medical school application

While most students see the summer as an opportunity to relax and kick back, the pre-med should see it as an opportunity to boost their medical school application. Summer provides a great chance to boost your med school application and do things which can separate you from the average pre med. During the school year there isn’t always enough time to get done all of the many things a pre med should do. Making good grades usually takes priority over volunteering, shadowing, and research. Thats the great thing about summer, it gives the busy pre med time to get things done. And over the course of 3 to 4 summers , you can easily do everything you need to build up an amazing application. So what should you be doing during your precious summer if you want to get into medical school?

Six ways you can productively spend your summer to help make an awesome med school application:

Do a lot of volunteering
Shadow a physician
Get medical experience
Do research
Study for MCAT
Take summer classes

Do a lot of volunteering: One of the most underrated aspects of medical school applications is how many volunteering hours you have done. This is actually a huge deal to whether you get accepted or not. Applicants who have great GPA and MCAT scores don’t get accepted because they don’t have enough volunteer hours. This is great news for those who have lower and less competitive GPA’s because it helps even the playing field. Use summer as an opportunity to rack up a huge amount of volunteer hours and help give yourself a big boost to your application. Click here for help finding volunteering opportunities.

Shadow a physician: Every pre-med knows that shadowing a physician is very important for having a good medical school application. It is often very difficult to find a physician to shadow and also just as difficult to find the time during the week to shadow a doctor. Often most doctors start work early in the morning and a round can last several hours, which might interfere with your classes. If you have a busy school schedule then you might not have time to shadow during the school week and summer becomes the only viable time to do it. (Find out some of the best ways to find a doctor to shadow)

Get medical experience: Even if you can’t shadow a physician, just getting experience in a medical environment is definitely better than none. Working in the hospital doing almost any job, whether that is just desk work still counts towards medical experience in the eyes of the medical school. If you are doing desk work try to have a proper ergonomic office chair so that you take care of your posture. Most importantly , medical colleges want to know you have been exposed to the medical environment. Summer is a great time to get experience in the medical field while also earning some money. Things like being a tech or an EMT can be very rewarding but also hard to get into.Search online for possible job opportunities near by that will look good on your application.

Do research: This is another thing you can do to help spice up your medical school application. While it is not necessary to do research to get into medical school it is always welcomed and looks good. This could be what separates you from the other applicant they are considering. You can do research for one of your professors at school or you can find summer research programs. Check here for help finding research programs.

Study for MCAT: This might not be for everyone since some of you may have already taken the MCAT but for those of you who haven’t, summer can provide a great opportunity to prepare for it. The MCAT covers a lot of material so summer is a great because it provides the opportunity to really focus on the MCAT. There are many great resources for studying for MCAT and prep books that can really help. If you have the MCAT ahead of you , don’t waste this opportunity! (I will be posting a thorough guide on how to prepare for MCAT soon!)

Take summer classes: Summer classes are great for two main reasons. First, they will help you graduate and move through your pre-med program faster. This is important because it allows you to become a doctor that much sooner but also it might make a difference when you take the MCAT or you apply for medical school. It could mean the difference between getting in one year or the next. Second, summer classes provide a great chance to boost your GPA. Taking a class during summer is usually a lot easier than taking it during the semester. This is because during the semester you have to focus on about 5 different classes, while in summer you only have to focus on one or two. This gives you much more time to study and not be overwhelmed by too much coursework. Taking a class during summer can help give you an edge in making an A.

These are my recommendations on how you should spend your summer if you want to boost your med school application. I don’t recommend trying to do everything in one summer, while you certainly can, if you just focus on one or two things from this list you will do yourself a great favor. I hope this helps!

Tell us what you think by leaving a comment down below! For more pre-med tips and advice, make sure to subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on Facebook, twitter, and pinterest!

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