past interview questions

8/4/2019 Past Interview Questions

1/8

-Why medicine?

-What pressures are put on doctors?

-As a doctor, how would you overcome these pressures?

-What pressures are there on medicine as a whole?

-Tell us about one patient you met during your work experience that stood

out to you.

-How could that patients care have been made better?

-Imagine you are a doctor. You have a male patient who is married and has

a family. You have just had results back that confirm he is HIV+, what are you

going to do?

-Your next patient dies because you made a mistake, what are you going to

do?

-Why aren't you taking biology A-level?

-Is psychology an art or a science?

-Tell me about the differences between medical practice in America (where I

did some work exp) and here.

-Why did you apply to Cardiff? (a tad unfair, I thought, since you don't want

to criticise, or praise too much!)

-How will you cope with the stresses of medicine?

-What have you heard from your other three unis?

-What would you spend 50 on if I were to give it to you for tonight?

-What are your views on the Phillips paper (not quite as relevant now, I had

my interview a couple of days after it came out)

-You're the first person I've met to have worked in a hospice (yeah,

right)...what did you learn there?

*what have you heard form everywhere else you've applied to?

*how do you relax?

*how do you deal with stressful situations/'difficult' customers?

*what would you do if something went wrong?

*tell us about a recent medical advance you have read about in the

newspapers.

*what area are you most interested in?

*what out of school interests do you have?

*details of work exp.

*What makes a good doctor - what qualities? (this one they dragged out

forever..."what else?what else?you've said that already...carry on ...!)

-I understand you have had work experience at a general practice and at a

hospital, what were the differences between the two placements?

-What are the qualities of a good doctor?


2/8

-Why do you want to study medicine?

-I have heard that you read science journals. Is there anything that you have

read that has struck you?

-Do you believe what you read was a break through?

-I read here that your father is a doctor. You have obviously had an insight of

a career of medicine from one side? Did this influence you to take a career in

medicine?

-What did you learn from your work experience?

-Did everyone go home after being treated at the ward you were working

at?

-What do you do to relax?

- In what area do you think you'd like to specialise?

- What percentage of a doctor's work is just social work?

- If you were health secretary what would you do to improve the NHS?

- Would a huge pay rise for medical staff help?

- What would you do about improving the organisation of the NHS? (said that

i didn't know much about the organisation so i can't really answre th at)

- What have you gained from working with disabled people? (don't think i

answered that properly)

- If a child was in need of surgery and the parents were being extremely

demanding, what would you do?

tell us about ur work experience and what did u learn from it? do u think it

was beneficial

-What do you know about variant CJD? It will soon be standard practice to

screen blood donors for vCJD. If you found that a potential donor was vCJDpositive would you tell them and why?

- How does the government find out about problems and issues in the NHS?

-I see you are a beach lifeguard. Does this involve regular training and

updating of ur skills? [Doctors are constantly learning new things so this one

was quite good 4 me to go on about]

-i see here, you worked at an old people's home, what did u learn about

people??

-what pressures are there on doctors?

-they asked something which drew on from my answer about doctors to not

get too emotionally involved.....and asked "what do u mean docs shouldnt

get emotionally involved wit patients?"

-I see here u were chosen to be school captain....tell me why u think u were

elected? ( i dnt bloody knw..........it was a FIX LOL)

-I see here u are doin an AS in ICT? how do u think IT can help within

medicine?

- asked me abt evidence based learning and how is this helpful...or sumthin


3/8

along those lines.

- have u always wanted to be a doc?? or when did u decide?

- why do u need a challenging career??

- tell me about a paitient u saw on ur work expierience?

- why did this certain person stand out in ur mind?

- how did she get kidney failure?

- was she on insulin??

- what type of art do u like ?

- what artist and why ?

- what do u think of damien hursts work and tracey emins?

- would u pay 500 for it ?

- how can art be used with disabled children ?

- what have u learnt most from ur work experience ?

- how would u befriend an elderly person different to a young one in hosp ?

-what do u think about doc's private hours cut down ?

and.... finally ... why can't dialysis paitients dialy se at night?

-Is there anything in particular about UCL that you like?

-Did you go on the tour?

-What did you learn from it?

-Can you tell me about any recent medical issues that paint medicine in

good light, and bad? (I talked about von Hagens' exhibition)

-Have you seen Bodyworlds?

-What are the qualities of a good doctor? (classic)

-What do you like about your A level subjects?

-Why did you choose to abandon the humanities?-What further reading have you done?

-What do you do to relax?

-What about skiing do you l ike?

-If you had to tell us one thing about you before we make up our minds, what

would it be?

- how r u. (Lulling me into a sence of security)

-what articles have you read that are medically related. Warbled on about

the cervical cancer vaccine and cloning.

- What newspapers do you read, do u beleive what the news papers say.

- Do you think cloning is a good idea.

- I see that on your form you say u are dyslexic, how will this affect u as a

medic. (Yuck yuck, ok so this would be part of the pressure thing i suppose)

- Why now (as you are "quite" old )?

- What I learned from my voluntary work.

- Did I have a chance to spend much time with doctors while doing this? (not

really but told them I had mature PRHO friends so had talked to them about


4/8

it.)

- What qualities do you think you can bring to medicine? Talked about

communication skills and used an example of being an employee

representative for a strategic review at work. (strategic review= euphemism

for when companies want to make more than 20 people redundant in one

dept.)

- What I had learned from this about "management". (managed not to say

that I think they're a bunch of cynical lying bastards who wouldn't know the

truth if it came up and punched them).

- Questions about PS. My jobs since returning to UK 3 years ago. What I do in

my current job.

- How I think working for NHS would be different from working for a private

sector (Software) company. Didn't really get the question - they were talking

about the frustrations of such a move. (think they were talking in terms of the

fact that the NHS is strapped for cash).

What did you learn from your w/e?

What kind of patients were on the ward?

What did u learn from your voluntary work?

Were you always on the same ward?

( I'm trying to think of something helpful, but there wasn't anything!!)

Did you see the same patients more than once?

What did you gain from changing schools at sixth form?

How did you benefit from doing extracurricular activities at new school?

I see you visited bodyworlds, do you think it was right to display organs in thatway (response, it was good for us prospective med students as i thought it

was interesting etc etc but no because its not right exhibiting pplz insides in

that way... lead on to autopsy , you can prob guess the rest..)

Question about CEP project we did in school..

Why diabetes (we did the cep proj on a health education booklet, on

diabetes)

Did you do it on diabetes because incidence of diabetes in an asian

population is so high?

What percentage of people have diabetes?

What have you just studies in chem? (said rates of reaction coz like

treatments there's more than 1 thing that can bring about a change) .talk

bout ur bullshittin (and quick thinkin...)

-Question related to kinetic theory... how temp affects rate..

-Question on what we're learning in bio..

-Question relatin to bio work ...which i mentioned


5/8

-Question about euthanasia, do you think its right?... long discussion which i

refered to reginal crewe etc etc

-Question about organ trade, is it right for money?

- What position do you play in rugby? - Clearly fortifying their squad. He was

writing this down.

- I see you speak french? Oui un peu, he didn't understand! Oops!

- Is it a family thing?

- Why did you choose to take the International Baccaulaureate?

- Where do you see yourself in twenty years time?

- What are the demands of a medical carrer?

- Why should we take you?

-Do you think people should sell organs?

-Can you name any major markets in medicine?

-Do you read news articles?

- Tell me about the human genome project?

-Do you think it is a good thing for people to know they will develop an illness.

-You think it would give them peace of mind?

-Name me prevelent conditions which have a genetic basis? Dementia,

Cerebral Palsy (I forgot to say congenitial heart disease, diabities, cancer -

the biggest one's!!!!)

-Do you have any question for us?

Questions about voluntary work and what I do

- You seem very busy, yet you play football every day...

- What do you think you can bring to UCL? (chatted about Amnesty)

- Did you think the BMAT essay was a good idea? (Yeah bigged it up proper)- What's Amnesty's stance on organ donation? (What the hell?!?!)

- One thing that shocked you during your work experience

- Did this not put you off medicine?

- What do you think is the biggest problem facing medicine in the 21st

century?

- What do you think you can bring to UCL?

- Did you think the BMAT essay was a good idea?

- What's Amnesty's stance on organ donation?

- If all available organs werent working what would you do?

- I think you misunderstood, have you heard of organ rejection and how this

occurs?

- You mentioned the heart attack patient you saw earliar. How does this

happen?

- What can be done to treat this?

- If this was unavailable what could you do alternatively?)

- Any questions?


6/8

What qualities make a good doctor, and which of these qualities do you

think you possess?

At your work experience did you see all these skills, give us an example.

Who else did you talk to at you work experience?

What recent medical advancements have you read about?

What have you read that tells you about medicine as a career?

Consider this example; The government is considering giving all doctors

guidelines for all cases. Should this protocol always be followed in all ca ses?

Should doctors ever have to think outside the box?

How would you deal with not being able to complete a form of treatment

because of inadequate funding?

Why did you go to radiology in your work experience? Were you

considering that as a possible career path?

* They asked me to speak about Theology Alevel what it involves why I did it n

how it is relevent to medicine ( i told them half of it was on ethics)

* Spoke about new drinking laws + whether it was good or bad, and to

approach it also from an ethical point of view (e.g. free choice)

* Spoke about smoking regulations how was it fair we use to be ableto only

drink untill say 11,but could smoke whenever, even though passive smoking

effects the people around you but drinking doesnt.

* Asked me how i delt with pressure

* Asked me a little bit about my work experience

* So i see you've volunteered in a nursery, why do you want to become a

doctor and not a nursery teacher?

* How do you relax? what do you do to relax?

* What would you do on a long plane journey?

* What would you read if i locked you up in a house for a week?

* Why UCL?

* Questions about the bmat essay i wrote.

* What advantage does playing the viola have over playing the violin?

* Why did you choose to apply for medicine instead of mu sic?

* BMAT questions: Can you summarise the main arguments in your essay?

* Is that really what you mean?(oops!)

Interviewer asked me whether i think clean drinking water for all is more

important than medicine for all the sick then decided that it was a difficult

question to answer

* If you had limited resources in a hospital, how would you choose which


7/8

SARS patients to admit?

* How do you plan to pay for your medical education?

* Why do you want to be a doctor?

* Why not a nurse?

* What qualities do you think a doc shud have?

* Do you have these qualities?

* Tell me about (insert hobby)

* What sort of illnesses did you see at your work experience?

* Follow on questions about MRSA (what i saw, what is it etc)

* Tell me about differences in healthcare in england and bahrain (where i did

some work exp)

* You shadowed X what did you see that was intersting, was there a patient

that stood out to you?

* You wake up tomoro and you are the minister of health, what changes

would you make to the NHS?

* Should ther be a limit on how much funding the NHS should receive?

* What is that limit?

* More questions about hobbies.

* Then, your bmat essay discussed patient confidentiality with minors.

* When wud there be a cause to break confidentiality of an adult?

* Who would you break it to?

* When would you involove the family ( because i said the reason could be

threatening to commit suicide)* When would you involve the police..would you at all?

* Do you think people with self inflicted diseases such as obesity, alcoholi sm

should be refused treatment?

* You play piano, how's that going?

* Why do you want to do medicine?

* How is it that you developed your interest in the body?

* Tell me about a recent problem about funding in the nhs (talked about

herceptin but in hindsight i think he may well have been asking about pfi

etc..oops)

* Tell me about what you saw on work experience

* You also spent some time with your gp, did you talk to any of the patients

there?

* (about something i wrote in the bmat essay) Give me an examp le of where

a doctor would have to tell a partner about his patient

* Who can doctors go to to discuss such problems?


8/8

* So you volunteer with children, what exactly do you do there? how did this

boy with learning difficulties become like that?

past interview questions

Documents