How much do you need to know going into interviews?

[MiesVanDerMom]

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Exactly how well read do you need to be going into the interview process? I've been reading journal articles on my area of primary interest (BPD) but should I also be reading up in a lot of other areas?

 

[peppy]

Pimping on psych topics is not a normal interview tactic. One interviewer asked me about what journal articles I had read, but that was just one interview and it wasn't asked in a confrontational way. Most psych interviews are pretty laidback. Psychiatrists are USUALLY pretty good at interviewing people. 🙂
One question you should definitely expect a lot is "What questions do you have for me?".
Sometimes interviewers will open the interview with that question and expect the whole interview to just be you asking them questions.
Personally, though, I think that when that question is the whole interview it's a bit of a cop-out and reflects badly on the interviewer. When I interviewed with a program director at the place I had rotated at, even though she already knew me better than most applicants, she still made an effort to think of thoughtful, personalized questions about myself...because she actually did care about knowing who I was. Unfortunately, far too often it seems that interviewers are kind of lazy and know they are in a position where they can expect applicants to do their job for them by asking all the questions.

 

[OldPsychDoc]

Think of it from another perspective: if I'm not the PD or APD, I'm voluntarily taking 20-30 minutes out of the peak of my clinic day, or rounding, or whatever, knowing that that time will have to be made up at the end of the day or skipping lunch or whatever.

In that time, I have to figure out if you match in person what you so carefully crafted on paper. I want to know if you truly want to be a psychiatrist, what your attitudes about mental illness are, if you are the kind of resident I want on my team, if you'll fit in with the residents we already have, if you'll be happy in our community, if you'll show up for work, if you're not going to kill my patients on call....in general, what sort of person are you?

And in addition, if I do like you enough, and think you'll do well enough, I need to represent my program and community in such a way that you might want to rank us a little higher than the other programs you're visiting, and try to show you that we're even better than we sound on our website.

So really, it's the ultimate in "speed dating", and I don't have time or the inclination to "pimp" for obscure knowledge.

 

[Manicsleep]

This reminds me of a great story. Since I am sick and bored today, I will tell you.

We had an analyst that would like to put people in pressure situations and ask odd questions. Like saying "i know you dont want to come here so tell me what else can we do with our time etc."

However, he would relent eventually and tell the interviewee. His claim was that physicians are going to be under pressure from patients and superiors. They need to be able to respond.

He rarely said he wouldnt recommend someone as most people were able to come up with some sort of answer to his inane question. However, once this guy kinda freaked out but he was related to a faculty member at the university medical school and ended up coming to our residency.

He was not cut out for psychiatry. This guy should have been a pathologist, radiologist or somewhere there are no wild patients. He would be fine as long as you had "run of the mill crazy" but a few times on call those sh*tstorms happen and there is just nothing to do but embrace the suck. Well he didn't do so well. The first time he freaked out and just went and laid down in the call room, called the senior and said I am not doing this anymore. It was still early in internship and so we counseled him and nothing bad happened. He even survived internal medicine as we warned them (plus they have a cap and a lot of support etc.)
Its january now and he is back on psychiatry but now the senior takes only home call for the wards as the interns are supposed to have their act together in the ER. Its winter and a major storm hits out of nowhere late at night...well out of the north but it was unexpected. All the homeless, drug addicts etc come rolling in to the hostpitals becuase they didnt go to the shelters in time. AKA the mother of all sh*tstorms.

The guy just leaves.
He leaves, out the door, to his car and just drives away.
The ER is calling the wards, the wards are calling the senior, everyone is trying to page this guy. Nothing.
Eventually the senior pages me and we are cleaning up the mess in the ER and on the wards because this commotion has the wards acting up. BTW, I swear that borderlines have a sixth sense that can tell when drama is afoot.
Suddenly I hear my name being called by a trauma patient being brought in by a squad. ITS HIM!! He looks like a mess and I thought he just got mugged or something. NOPE. He took off in his car and not realizing how fast he was going in snow, crashed his car, AWD Audi, in a ditch...he rolled it twice I believe.
He went on leave and was later placed on academic probation until he proved that he just couldnt make it (yes we gave him psychiatric help).

The moral of the story is: Dont pay the extra money for the AWD.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

i swear that borderlines have a sixth sense that can tell when drama is afoot.

so true.

 

[sideways]

The moral of the story is: Dont pay the extra money for the AWD.

In his case he should have paid a lot more and gotten a much faster AWD.

What an awful fashion for a career to fall apart. The amount of work it takes to get to where he was, and to then lose it. Sucks.

 

[Manicsleep]

In his case he should have paid a lot more and gotten a much faster AWD.

What an awful fashion for a career to fall apart. The amount of work it takes to get to where he was, and to then lose it. Sucks.

I know but you never really get tested until your intern year right?
Luckily he is quite smart, had an MBA and now has a desk job in healthcare. I posted this because he maintains that nobody will die if he freaks out a little bit. We still keep in touch and he has been able to joke about his breakdown and even use it for motivational talks.

I actually think he could have made it. Not at our program but at any program with night float as all his problems seemed to happen late at night but everyone, including him to this very day, dismissed the sleep component. Of course I may be biased. 🙄

I have had some strange things happen to me, nothing even comes close to that night. I have come across some offbeat analysts and that night I gained some serious respect for an old school psychiatrist.

 

[sideways]

I know but you never really get tested until your intern year right?
Luckily he is quite smart, had an MBA and now has a desk job in healthcare. I posted this because he maintains that nobody will die if he freaks out a little bit. We still keep in touch and he has been able to joke about his breakdown and even use it for motivational talks.

I actually think he could have made it. Not at our program but at any program with night float as all his problems seemed to happen late at night but everyone, including him to this very day, dismissed the sleep component. Of course I may be biased. 🙄

I have had some strange things happen to me, nothing even comes close to that night. I have come across some offbeat analysts and that night I gained some serious respect for an old school psychiatrist.

Am I way off-base in thinking that a group of derelicts coming into the ER wouldn't be that stressful for me? It almost seems like a caricature of reality, and at that point you're not really trying to "heal their minds," but just sort of work like a traffic cop for the evening.

Or am I in for a wake-up call (just finished 1st year, so I'm just imagining)?

 

[OldPsychDoc]

Am I way off-base in thinking that a group of derelicts coming into the ER wouldn't be that stressful for me? It almost seems like a caricature of reality, and at that point you're not really trying to "heal their minds," but just sort of work like a traffic cop for the evening.

Or am I in for a wake-up call (just finished 1st year, so I'm just imagining)?

I think your attitude will serve you well---but the sheer volume sometimes... I can remember nights in our psych ED when there would be 10-12 cases on the board, and even just trying to be the traffic cop felt pretty overwhelming. (I'm thinking about the end of "Animal House", with Kevin Bacon as the ROTC cadet..."Remain Calm. Remain Calm" )

 

[NJWxMan]

Our psych ED regularly has 20-25 patients.

 

[TexasPhysician]

I interviewed at over 10 programs. Not a single interviewer brought up anything about current journals, pimping, or anything else related.

 

[Manicsleep]

20-25 regularly. For 1 intern? Wow.
We had about 10 but some nights it could get to the 20-25 number. However, the person was only working in the ER and didnt have to worry about covering the wards.

Oh and to the OP.

I have been asked specific questions usually only when I brought them up. Once I was asked whats your favorite SSRI in the course of regular conversation but rarely do people pimp you unless you bring up something. Then it is usually the natural course of the conversation and two people just talking about something they enjoy.

 

[whopper]

There's been previous threads on this topic. Look them up in a search and you'll get answers.

My own experience and my memory on this is getting filled with more and more cobwebs (it's been 6 years!)
-I remember one guy berating me the entire interview. A friend of my in the program later told me this guy appears to get off on ruining other people's moods and was later alleged to have assaulted a resident.
-2 programs made me take an exam. One made me take a multiple choice test, the other a written exam.
-One PD interviewed me and made some IMHO callous assumptions of me based on my race.

I'm an Asian-American. He asked me what it was like to grow up with so much pressure to become a medical doctor from my parents. I never once told him I had such pressure, nor did I mention any of this in my application. He also told me I made my parents mandate--being that he said he would be happy to have me in his residency program. Again, I gave him no data for him to make this assumption of my parents having some type of medical mandate on me. He also mentioned that I was a dutiful son to follow my parent's orders.

Hmm, I wonder, if I were a PD and I asked an applicant who was African-American, "So, tell me why you're so interested in basketball? Why do you love Barack Obama so much? It's not normal for African Americans to go to medical school, so were you adopted by White parents?"

Aside from that, the interviews were harmless. Most of the interviewers asked psychiatry questions, but in the context of wanting to get to know me better. They weren't with the intention to test me or make me feel uncomfortable. While the above incidents were bad, they were the minority.

 

[Manicsleep]

Multiple choice tests?

Holy crap! I would have summoned Kitt and gotten the heck out of there. Glad I never had these experiences.

If you are in Ohio, I think I know who the written exam was (northern city and not a great program, a little false advertising by name??)

I have heard of the "telephone test" where the attending says "i am waiting for an important phone call" and then leaves the room a little later.
The phone rings:
1) You answer: the attending on the other lines yells: "why are you answering, I am trying to check my voicemail, I told you I was expecting an important phone call!"
2) You dont answer: he comes back and asks if anyone called and when you say no he freaks out "i told you i was expecting an important phone call!"

Probably urban legend but I always wanted to try it...

 

[peppy]

I'm an Asian-American. He asked me what it was like to grow up with so much pressure to become a medical doctor from my parents. I never once told him I had such pressure, nor did I mention any of this in my application. He also told me I made my parents mandate--being that he said he would be happy to have me in his residency program. Again, I gave him no data for him to make this assumption of my parents having some type of medical mandate on me. He also mentioned that I was a dutiful son to follow my parent's orders.

That is really rude and unprofessional. I guess in a way it's a blessing in disguise to see the true colors of people like this at the interview rather than when you match there. Unfortunately now that psychiatry seems to be getting more competitive I am concerned that applicants will have to put up with more bad behavior like this because programs know that applicants have less opportunity to be picky.

 

[notdeadyet]

I'm an Asian-American. He asked me what it was like to grow up with so much pressure to become a medical doctor from my parents. I never once told him I had such pressure, nor did I mention any of this in my application. He also told me I made my parents mandate--being that he said he would be happy to have me in his residency program. Again, I gave him no data for him to make this assumption of my parents having some type of medical mandate on me. He also mentioned that I was a dutiful son to follow my parent's orders.

What's weird is that this is literally the fourth or fifth time I've heard someone saying they encountered the Asian stereotyping at interviews. Very sad...

 

[whopper]

I'm in Ohio, but I only came to this area for forensic training. I did most of my interviews in the NJ/NYC/PA area for residency.

The specific program where the person made racial stereotypes, I don't know if the PD is still the same person, but residents at that program told me they weren't surprised. They said this guy had a habit of seemingly trying to get under people's skin to see the reaction. I will say it was in Philadelphia.

The program with the multiple choice test was in North Jersey (that narrows it to one of 2 programs for the curious!, there are now 3 programs in that area, but one of them didn't exist when I interviewed).

The program where the guy berated me, that one is in NYC. A good friend of mine did her training there. She said about 1 year after my interview, he approached a resident, yelled at him, and then grabbed the resident by the jacket and pushed him. The resident brought it up to the GME, and the department in response placed the attending in a research-only position where he had no exposure to residents. Other people I know who trained there said that attending was all about pimping.

All in all, with the knowledge I know now, I wouldn't have cared. I had multiple interviews. The first 15 minutes of the interview in NYC, I was somewhat perturbed, but then I thought about it, and thought to myself, "Forget it, don't even go to this program. Use this as an opportunity to practice for future tight interview situations. Let this clown bark all he wants, you have other options."

My point being is as long as you have several options, don't let this type of interview get you down. Besides, even if you do get this type of interview, the best way to conduct yourself is to maintain your composure and just go through with it while maintaining your dignity. If the guy's testing your ability to stay cool, then you likely will have passed the test. If he's just an A-hole who wants to ruin your day, well now he failed. Either way, you'll end up on top.

And remember, this was the minority. Most of the programs that extend an interview really want you to consider their program.

 

[Cinnameg]

Our psych ED regularly has 20-25 patients.

Where are you at??? I was disappointed in my psych residency -- at our VA -- when most of my nights on call only got a single patient, or three at the most. I'd like to go to residency somewhere with high volume. So . . . where in NJ is your program?

 

[Cinnameg]

I'm an Asian-American. He asked me what it was like to grow up with so much pressure to become a medical doctor from my parents. I never once told him I had such pressure, nor did I mention any of this in my application. He also told me I made my parents mandate--being that he said he would be happy to have me in his residency program. Again, I gave him no data for him to make this assumption of my parents having some type of medical mandate on me. He also mentioned that I was a dutiful son to follow my parent's orders.

That's really awful. I hope for the sake of the interviewer's patients that he had your application mixed up with somebody else's personal statement -- otherwise, shame on him.

 

[whopper]

No. He couldn't have mixed it up based on other things he said.

He did mention that he knew he was stereotyping, but he felt he had the right to do so because of his own ethnicity, claiming that his ethnicity was the same as mine by culture, if not skin color, so he knew that all these things were going on.

(Well, I will give him this....one of his assumptions was going on. My parents did push me to become a physician, but I didn't go that route because of them. In fact they were not happy with me being a psychiatrist, but that was the only reason why I went to medical in the first place--to be one. This was after I spent 1 year on deciding to be an artist against their wishes, and was happy with the decision. I only changed my mind because the more psychology classes I took, the more and more it drew me to the mental health field. I only chose psychiatry because I was drawn to the physiological explanations of disorders more so than the other aspects. The attraction to the behavioral sciences eventually overcame my love for art.

My own relationship with my parents is more of a Margaret Cho type of thing. I love them but they drive me nuts, and I am nothing like the image of a "dutiful son." In fact if anything, I'm more like Howard Stern with his own parents. He loves them, but he openly mocks their aspects that drive him nuts.)

Psychiatrists were tested in their ability to detect people not telling the truth. It turned out their ability was not statistically significantly better than a college student. So if a psychiatrist starts believing he is somehow right despite his patient's protests, he better have better have evidence and reasoning better than simply because he is a psychiatrist he is right.

But I digress------I've hijacked the thread and made it about me.