Is it possible to get accepted to medical school with a really bad interview?

Discover Your Odds of Getting into Medical School
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My presentation abilities are subpar, but interviewing (1v1 conversation) and presenting to an audience are separate skills.

And to answer your question, you definitely should aim for a good interview, but it's still just one aspect of your application.

Practice out loud, with friends, etc.
 
premed2013 said:
I have a 3.7 GPA and a 35 MCAT score but I have horrible presentation skills. Is it possible to get into medical school with poor interview skills?
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Interview is in the top 3, behind GPA and the MCAT imo. There are guides on SDN on how to leave good impressions. Try some of those. Good luck!
 
I had two highly awkward interviews that turned into acceptances, so it is possible. As long as you come off reasonably normal, and try to be a pleasant interviewee (listen well, be polite, and be extremely honest), you should be fine. A little bit of preparation goes a long way.
 
An awkward interview and a bad interview are two totally different things. Stammering a little is OK, blanking on everything and/or insulting your interviewer is not.
 
Your school's Career Services/whatever it's called office might offer mock or practice interviews. Maybe taking advantage of one of these might help your interviewing, or at least your confidence.
 
You should mock interview with people you know/work with/work for as well as people you don't know well. You might find that you're more nervous having a good friend interview you. Developing an ability to answer with that added pressure will only help you on the big day.
 
most of the people interviewing you are stuck up, and anal retentive. i would play my cards well.

Kiss their butt if they allow it, and see how it goes!!!
 
Pre interview I went 10 for 10

Post interview I went 1 for 7 (I declined three interviews after getting the acceptance)

The interview is a HUGE part of the application. If you know it's a problem now, get help with it. I'm definitely planning on getting help with this before residency apps. It's a shame for 4 years of hard work to get erased in half an hour.
 
rhesuspieces said:
An awkward interview and a bad interview are two totally different things. Stammering a little is OK, blanking on everything and/or insulting your interviewer is not.
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They're exactly the same thing, its just semantics. Most would agree that blanking on everything and insulting your interviewer are pretty darn awkward.
 
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classydingo said:
Pre interview I went 10 for 10

Post interview I went 1 for 7 (I declined three interviews after getting the acceptance)

The interview is a HUGE part of the application. If you know it's a problem now, get help with it. I'm definitely planning on getting help with this before residency apps. It's a shame for 4 years of hard work to get erased in half an hour.
Click to expand...

👍. It's ridiculous that your application is ultimately decided by something that has nothing to do with medicine, but that's how the game is played. Interview well is the best advice.
 
I know it's hard for a lot of people, but I just went in and tried to treat it like a conversation. Interviewers must get sick of people trying to impress them, being fake, etc. Just try to be yourself, or at least someone who doesn't come off as a d-bag.
 
I'm not sure how it works for admissions interviews, but normally when I speak to people who are in a position to get me something, I've found that talking to them like a colleague makes everyone the most comfortable. Obviously be respectful and use proper address, but they are a person just like you. If you put them on too high a pedestal, it just gets awkward for everyone involved.
 
The truth is no one knows for sure, and it's likely going to depend on the entirety of your application. If you have some outstanding things in your application, I have no doubt they might make up for a bad interview. There are some schools that don't care about numbers once you interview, and for them obviously the interview is extremely important. Each school is going to have its own philosophy.

Interviewing is a learned skill like anything else. If you practice, you'll get better.
 
It absolutely is possible. Try to relax, speak slowly, and stay calm. You can be upfront with them and say 'sorry I'm a little nervous this is what I've looked forward to for years!' Can't hurt.
 
Dr Love said:
👍. It's ridiculous that your application is ultimately decided by something that has nothing to do with medicine, but that's how the game is played. Interview well is the best advice.
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cuz talking to people isn't a part of medicine...

There are some real tool premeds out there. I had an interviewee tell me that "clinical medicine and primary care were 'beneath him'..."
 
Dr Love said:
👍. It's ridiculous that your application is ultimately decided by something that has nothing to do with medicine, but that's how the game is played. Interview well is the best advice.
Click to expand...

Nothing to do with medicine? How does communicating with a stranger and building a transient relationship with someone not have anything to do with medicine?
 
Interviewing is the most important part of application.

Applied 21 schools, 11 interviews, 0 acceptances. Tells you something.


They say be honest, but NO don't be honest. Don't relax either. Always be on guard. They ask crazy questions to throw you off.
 
NickNaylor said:
Nothing to do with medicine? How does communicating with a stranger and building a transient relationship with someone not have anything to do with medicine?
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+1

Lacking people skills will be a huge obstacle that you will need to overcome if you want to be a good doctor (unless you go into pathology or something w/o patient contact).

Can you take a gap year and focus on your people skills? Interviewing skills will serve you well your entire life! You don't want to have trouble networking, gaining internships/externships/residency b/c you have trouble interviewing!
 
anbuitachi said:
Interviewing is the most important part of application.

Applied 21 schools, 11 interviews, 0 acceptances. Tells you something.


They say be honest, but NO don't be honest. Don't relax either. Always be on guard. They ask crazy questions to throw you off.
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Haha. Crazy questions like why do you want to be a doctor, what has influenced your life, and where do you see yourself in ten years? Get a grip and welcome to the real world.
 
anbuitachi said:
Interviewing is the most important part of application.

Applied 21 schools, 11 interviews, 0 acceptances. Tells you something.


They say be honest, but NO don't be honest. Don't relax either. Always be on guard. They ask crazy questions to throw you off.
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Seriously? How is this possible? What did you do in your interviews? Do you have any idea what went wrong?
 
anbuitachi said:
Interviewing is the most important part of application.

Applied 21 schools, 11 interviews, 0 acceptances. Tells you something.


They say be honest, but NO don't be honest. Don't relax either. Always be on guard. They ask crazy questions to throw you off.
Click to expand...

Wow, talk about anxiety and paranoia. You must be very socially awkward... might wanna work on that before your next application cycle
 
CurrySpice said:
+1

Lacking people skills will be a huge obstacle that you will need to overcome if you want to be a good doctor (unless you go into pathology or something w/o patient contact).

Can you take a gap year and focus on your people skills? Interviewing skills will serve you well your entire life! You don't want to have trouble networking, gaining internships/externships/residency b/c you have trouble interviewing!
Click to expand...

"People skills" are definitely required to be a good clinician, I doubt anyone is going to argue with that. However, interview skills do not equal people skills.

Being the physician in a physician-patient interaction is a lot different than being interviewed for med school admissions. For one, the focus is completely on the other person. For some (probably most people), this makes absolutely no difference, and more power to these people. But for others (myself included) this is a complete game changer. As you can see from my earlier post, I absolutely suck at interviews and I generally consider myself to be the world's worst interviewee. However, in my clinical job before med school, and in the limited patient interactions I've had here so far, I've only received positive feedback (and the red ink all over my patient write-up is evidence to the fact that they are not just being nice).

Unfortunately, unless med schools start requiring real patient care experience with performance evaluations for admissions, the interview remains the best barometer they have future patient interactions. So, I'll say again, if you suck at interviews definitely get some help beyond your friends and family, but don't think it means you can't be a good physician.
 
SFGuy2011 said:
I know it's hard for a lot of people, but I just went in and tried to treat it like a conversation. Interviewers must get sick of people trying to impress them, being fake, etc. Just try to be yourself, or at least someone who doesn't come off as a d-bag.
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I agree. The best way to approach it is like a structured conversation. My best interview (IMO) was when I finally learned how to guide the conversation and make the points I wanted to make. I was so efficient (at this interview at least :|) we finished early and just sat around cracking jokes and talking about our interests etc. I will say my very first interview went horribly because I tried too hard to be relaxed and I don't think I was taken as seriously as I would have liked. Let them know you're serious without being too serious.

AmicaVera said:
I'm not sure how it works for admissions interviews, but normally when I speak to people who are in a position to get me something, I've found that talking to them like a colleague makes everyone the most comfortable. Obviously be respectful and use proper address, but they are a person just like you. If you put them on too high a pedestal, it just gets awkward for everyone involved.
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I know what you're saying but I think this can lead to problems for some. Many times your interviewers are Doctors (not just students) and accomplished professionals. They have experienced much more than you and probably don't see you as a colleague in that position. They do, however, want to know you would be a pleasant person to work with so definitely be personable and try not to act intimidated.

Being confident is very important but showing humility is equally valuable.
 
NickNaylor said:
Nothing to do with medicine? How does communicating with a stranger and building a transient relationship with someone not have anything to do with medicine?
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I've never seen a patient ask a doctor questions like "Who is your hero? What is one word to describe you? What is your biggest weakness?"

There are some commonalities between a medical school interview and a typical patient interaction - for example, they both involve talking - but not much.
 
Dr Love said:
I've never seen a patient ask a doctor questions like "Who is your hero? What is one word to describe you? What is your biggest weakness?"

There are some commonalities between a medical school interview and a typical patient interaction - for example, they both involve talking - but not much.
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...you're entirely missing the point. Obviously you're not going to be asked that kind of information as a physician. The questions you're being asked are irrelevant for the most part. It's your body language, the intonation of your voice, how you look at the interviewer... all of these subtle things and more impact how you're perceived, and in a patient setting that is absolutely critical.

I might agree that interviews shouldn't be the most important aspect of the application, but to say they offer no valuable information about an applicant or have no basis in medicine is just idiotic.
 
premed2013 said:
I have a 3.7 GPA and a 35 MCAT score but I have horrible presentation skills. Is it possible to get into medical school with poor interview skills?
Click to expand...

I can tell you from personal experience that it's possible to NOT get into medical school with strong interview skills. Also, the most socially inept pre-med I've ever met got accepted so.......
 
NickNaylor said:
...you're entirely missing the point. Obviously you're not going to be asked that kind of information as a physician. The questions you're being asked are irrelevant for the most part. It's your body language, the intonation of your voice, how you look at the interviewer... all of these subtle things and more impact how you're perceived, and in a patient setting that is absolutely critical.

I might agree that interviews shouldn't be the most important aspect of the application, but to say they offer no valuable information about an applicant or have no basis in medicine is just idiotic.
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That's an argument often made by people justifying the use of interviews. But the vast majority of applicants will not distinguish themselves during an interview, one way or another. For them, the interview score will depend largely on the interviewer's personal biases and/or mood. Do you realize that if you interview on a rainy day, your chances of admission drop to an extent comparable to a 4-point change on the MCAT? Does that make sense?

http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/181/12/933
 
premed2013 said:
I have a 3.7 GPA and a 35 MCAT score but I have horrible presentation skills. Is it possible to get into medical school with poor interview skills?
Click to expand...

Yes, it is. But you really need to practice to overcome these issues. I'm not specifically talking about just for interviews, I mean in general. Talk to people more often/get a job in retail/whatever it takes to become comfortable talking to people. If you can't hold a 30 second conversation with someone in an elevator without getting nervous, you're going to have issues that carry through in Med School. This is a chance to show how much of a "person" you are to people interviewing you because that can sell really well. Learn to talk casually/talk about yourself - this will save you on the interviews and when you're doctor. Also, not to make you feel bad, but its' not like you're going to have it any easier further down the trail - An interview for a fellowship in Oncology is two days of interviews with 12 people. Better get comfortable talking! 👍
 
I've heard adcoms say the main purposes of the interview is to make sure candidates can dress themselves and that they aren't sociopaths. I think the importance of the interview is a little overstated on SDN although I think it is an important component. My main problem is that its not very standardized, there are simply too many different interviewers seeing too many different candidates for there to be any significant comparison in the most part.

I mean, usually schools invite what ~50 candidates for an interview day? Each of these people sees 2 interviewers and an interviewer may see at most 4-5 of these candidates? It starts to matter a lot who your interviewer is and how well-respected they are within the institution. I don't know if its an anecdote or something that happens often, but I had much better success at schools where I interviewed with people who were important (ie Heads of Depts, Deans, etc.) instead of random faculty 112.
 
eli20 said:
I've heard adcoms say the main purposes of the interview is to make sure candidates can dress themselves and that they aren't sociopaths. I think the importance of the interview is a little overstated on SDN although I think it is an important component. My main problem is that its not very standardized, there are simply too many different interviewers seeing too many different candidates for there to be any significant comparison in the most part.
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+1.

On many adcoms, the interview is just a litmus test. I've heard an adcom member from a top 10 school say that they generally know who they want before the interviewees even walk through the door. Obviously this isn't true at every school, but definitely at some.
 
PA scares me somedays.

Being a human is a huge part of medicine. Are they going to ask your hero in practice? No. But they ARE going to tell you that they slept with a hooker of the same sex last night when they were cracked out, and you will need to be an effective communicator in that situation as well.

You also have to work as a team for the rest of your life and communicate with them.

Also, we need to end the discussion about taking substances before interviews.
 
Caesar said:
PA scares me somedays.

Being a human is a huge part of medicine. Are they going to ask your hero in practice? No. But they ARE going to tell you that they slept with a hooker of the same sex last night when they were cracked out, and you will need to be an effective communicator in that situation as well.

You also have to work as a team for the rest of your life and communicate with them.

Also, we need to end the discussion about taking substances before interviews.
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Yeah, I completely agree. That's why I said what I said :laugh: 👍
 
eli20 said:
I mean, usually schools invite what ~50 candidates for an interview day? Each of these people sees 2 interviewers and an interviewer may see at most 4-5 of these candidates? It starts to matter a lot who your interviewer is and how well-respected they are within the institution. I don't know if its an anecdote or something that happens often, but I had much better success at schools where I interviewed with people who were important (ie Heads of Depts, Deans, etc.) instead of random faculty 112.
Click to expand...

I don't necessarily agree with this argument or the rainy day argument. If you think about it, at a most schools, maybe 1 out of 4 interviewees get accepted right? So really what's most important is that you make the best impression out of the 4-5 people your interviewer has interviewed that day. Rainy day or sunny day, department head or not, your best shot at getting in is by presenting yourself well and coming across as articulate and sincere.

A large part of the admissions process is really the adcoms being overloaded with qualified individuals and basically looking for any reason at all not to give you an interview and/or acceptance. So with regards to the OP's question, of course you CAN get in with a bad interview. Just why would you provide them with a reason not to accept you?
 
Practice interviews are helpful. You also need to develop social skills, including the ability to establish rapport with someone (patient, colleague, interviewer, etc) in a short amount of time. If you can't do that, you will have a difficult time in medicine.
 
Disinence2 said:
You just gotta fake it for an hour or so! You can make it
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While the actual interview is only about an hour, the interview day will be much longer. You are being judged from the moment your shoe touches campus until the moment your leave and are out of sight. Try to be pleasant and social with everyone you meet, i.e., secretaries, other candidates, etc. You never know who is watching or who has the ear of the committe after you leave.
 
FuturePittMed said:
While the actual interview is only about an hour, the interview day will be much longer. You are being judged from the moment your shoe touches campus until the moment your leave and are out of sight. Try to be pleasant and social with everyone you meet, i.e., secretaries, other candidates, etc. You never know who is watching or who has the ear of the committe after you leave.
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Or, ya know, learn how to be that way all the time when you're with people? Socially awkward individuals need to really learn how to become better conversationalist if they expect to get anywhere in life, not just medicine. If you can't sell yourself to a complete stranger, how do you expect to get any job?
 
a big key to the interview is it lets the interviewers get a feel of your maturity level. It's entirely possible to get a great undergrad GPA, study hard and do well on MCATs, but still not have what it takes to be successful as a physician. Being smart enough is a requisite, but it isn't everything. You will have many more interviews [residency, fellowship, etc] so try to figure out why you aren't as good at them as you'd like- most of the time you're just 432663x more critical of yourself than you would be to someone else.

For interviews, I think it's most important to be yourself. If you misrepresent yourself [not necessarily lying] and you get in, you might be entering into a career path you're not suited for- it happened to a friend of mine pressured into med school by his family, now he's not graduating and trying to move into medical illustration instead. I personally gave an interviewer a piece of my mind and will be graduating from that school come May [I was vice president of our campus LGBT group, and the interviewer made some comment along the lines of if I was going to use my position as a political soapbox or something- I asked if we'd be having this conversation if I were vice president of Black Student Union instead and he shut up pretty quickly]
 
90minIPA said:
+1.

On many adcoms, the interview is just a litmus test. I've heard an adcom member from a top 10 school say that they generally know who they want before the interviewees even walk through the door. Obviously this isn't true at every school, but definitely at some.
Click to expand...

On ours (and probably at most schools) if an interviewer said there's absolutely no way a candidate should be admitted, they're gone. This cycle we rejected someone with ~4.0/40 with great ECs who applied EDP bc he was a serious dbag. The faculty member who presented him to the committee actually laughed.
 
drizzt3117 said:
On ours (and probably at most schools) if an interviewer said there's absolutely no way a candidate should be admitted, they're gone. This cycle we rejected someone with ~4.0/40 with great ECs who applied EDP bc he was a serious dbag. The faculty member who presented him to the committee actually laughed.
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This is what needs to be recorded and uploaded on SDN - examples of bad interviews so people know what NOT to do.
 
Kaustikos said:
This is what needs to be recorded and uploaded on SDN - examples of bad interviews so people know what NOT to do.
Click to expand...

"I don't know why anyone would be interested in primary care, only people who can't get into another specialty go into it." (to the fam med attending)

"what's my greatest weakness? I have a lot of difficulty dealing with people who aren't as smart as I am."

"my greatest strength is probably charisma..."

It was like a caricature, really, the staff read like 8-10 quotes word for word from the interview.
 
drizzt3117 said:
"I don't know why anyone would be interested in primary care, only people who can't get into another specialty go into it." (to the fam med attending)

"what's my greatest weakness? I have a lot of difficulty dealing with people who aren't as smart as I am."

"my greatest strength is probably charisma..."

It was like a caricature, really, the staff read like 8-10 quotes word for word from the interview.
Click to expand...
LOL
And these words came from the guy with "~4.0/40 with great ECs who applied EDP"?


classydingo said:
"People skills" are definitely required to be a good clinician, I doubt anyone is going to argue with that. However, interview skills do not equal people skills.

Being the physician in a physician-patient interaction is a lot different than being interviewed for med school admissions. For one, the focus is completely on the other person. For some (probably most people), this makes absolutely no difference, and more power to these people. But for others (myself included) this is a complete game changer. As you can see from my earlier post, I absolutely suck at interviews and I generally consider myself to be the world's worst interviewee. However, in my clinical job before med school, and in the limited patient interactions I've had here so far, I've only received positive feedback (and the red ink all over my patient write-up is evidence to the fact that they are not just being nice).

Unfortunately, unless med schools start requiring real patient care experience with performance evaluations for admissions, the interview remains the best barometer they have future patient interactions. So, I'll say again, if you suck at interviews definitely get some help beyond your friends and family, but don't think it means you can't be a good physician.
Click to expand...
+1 👍

...
 
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rhesuspieces said:
An awkward interview and a bad interview are two totally different things. Stammering a little is OK, blanking on everything and/or insulting your interviewer is not.
Click to expand...
I really think this is the truth. They know you're going to be out of your mind nervous. You may blank on something. You may stammer or trip over words. They understand this and it's not a big deal.

But if you're rude, lack people skills, or just don't at all know how to appropriately conduct yourself, you may have a bad interview. If that's the case for you then practice as much as you possibly can because this is something that you're going to need to overcome to go into medicine.
 
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