Preparing for medical ethical questions in an interview?

[radioactive15]

How would you recommend preparing for the medical ethics questions they ask during a med school interview?

Are the questions they generally ask common sense based or do they expect an answer that would require previous research of the laws and regulations of the medical field?

What types of ethical questions do they ask- ones with a strict right answer or more open-eded types where there is not really a wrong answer if you can explain your reasoning? Any good websites to prepare for these with sample Q&A?

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[lhooq]

Here is a good website that has an overview of bioethics topics that may be helpful to look over: https://depts.washington.edu/bioethx/topics/
The (few) ethical questions I got during interviews tended to be more open-ended; it seemed as if their goal was to determine how I thought about the issue as opposed to looking for one specific answer.

 

[Summertime012]

I found this site helpful.

http://depts.washington.edu/bioethx/topics/index.html

Best of luck!

 

[efle]

How would you recommend preparing for the medical ethics questions they ask during a med school interview?

Are the questions they generally ask common sense based or do they expect an answer that would require previous research of the laws and regulations of the medical field?

What types of ethical questions do they ask- ones with a strict right answer or more open-eded types where there is not really a wrong answer if you can explain your reasoning? Any good websites to prepare for these with sample Q&A?

The AMA Journal of Ethics
http://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/site/archives.html

 

[johnnytest]

I found this site helpful.

http://depts.washington.edu/bioethx/topics/index.html

Best of luck!

+1
I used this and it's such a good overall site. I didn't have any ethical questions but it's good to read up on it as a future doctor.

 

[Goro]

Read through the Interview feedback section of these pages.

Have an honest answer from the heart. I assume that you have an opinion on some things? Like would you prescribe a lethal dose of drugs for a dying patient? What do you do if your 14 year old patient wants an abortion? How do you deal with the choice of giving one to kidney to a 60 year old unemployed man or a 14 year old boy? What do you say to a woman who's newly pregnant, but you personally did the vasectomy on her husband??

How would you recommend preparing for the medical ethics questions they ask during a med school interview?

Are the questions they generally ask common sense based or do they expect an answer that would require previous research of the laws and regulations of the medical field?

What types of ethical questions do they ask- ones with a strict right answer or more open-eded types where there is not really a wrong answer if you can explain your reasoning? Any good websites to prepare for these with sample Q&A?

 

[Alejandro]

Ethical questions are also a chance for you to think, and in particular, to think OUT LOUD. Thus, when you do these questions, I think a good approach is to mention who is involved, what are the points of view, "why is it an ethical concern," and then after you're signposted/layed out everything, you can then say, I think we should do this followed by that.

 

[bc65]

Remember, answering the first question is only the beginning. If I'm asking the question, once you give your answer, whatever it is, I will challenge you with a follow-up question based on your answer. Each follow up question will dig you into a deeper and deeper hole. What differentiates one candidate from the other is how effectively you dig yourself out. The better candidates have fun with the process. For them, it's like playing chess.
The less successful candidates don't even realize they haven't identified the issues, and don't recognize contradictions in their answers.

 

[efle]

This must get interesting for people who have already studied moral philosophy and have a code they'd apply to any situation to the very last

Remember, answering the first question is only the beginning. If I'm asking the question, once you give your answer, whatever it is, I will challenge you with a follow-up question based on your answer. Each follow up question will dig you into a deeper and deeper hole. What differentiates one candidate from the other is how effectively you dig yourself out. The better candidates have fun with the process. For them, it's like playing chess.
The less successful candidates don't even realize they haven't identified the issues, and don't recognize contradictions in their answers.

 

[bc65]

This must get interesting for people who have already studied moral philosophy

It's frustrating for me when they have taken ethics classes and start talking about "autonomy" and "beneficence" instead of answering the question, but it's hard to fault them. It's how they were trained.

 

[GummyBeh]

Read through the Interview feedback section of these pages.

Have an honest answer from the heart. I assume that you have an opinion on some things? Like would you prescribe a lethal dose of drugs for a dying patient? What do you do if your 14 year old patient wants an abortion? How do you deal with the choice of giving one to kidney to a 60 year old unemployed man or a 14 year old boy? What do you say to a woman who's newly pregnant, but you personally did the vasectomy on her husband??

Curious when an interviewer asks-- do all question presuppose no legal presence and no legal ramifications, purely dealing with the moral question of what is the right and/or just and/or good? Or do they suppose knowledge of medical ethics and possibly legalese where the interview is being held?

I mean I imagine it's almost always safe to go with legality as the prime criterion in a situation where you have no idea what the mindset or prescriptive of the interviewer is... even if it's not, let's say morally justifiable. i.e. for example I think people shouldn't/should have the right to die, however I would not prescribe because that's the law of the land unless we're in Oregon etc.

 

[Goro]

We're not expecting you to be lawyers or doctors, or medical students who have had lectures on professional responsibility and ethics. We interviewers thus have "insider knowledge" that you don't.

However, we do expect you to have common sense, and more importantly, a moral compass. Thus, it's OK to say you're against abortion, or are against physician-assisted suicide.

Curious when an interviewer asks-- do all question presuppose no legal presence and no legal ramifications, purely dealing with the moral question of what is the right and/or just and/or good? Or do they suppose knowledge of medical ethics and possibly legalese where the interview is being held?

I mean I imagine it's almost always safe to go with legality as the prime criterion in a situation where you have no idea what the mindset or prescriptive of the interviewer is... even if it's not, let's say morally justifiable. i.e. for example I think people shouldn't/should have the right to die, however I would not prescribe because that's the law of the land unless we're in Oregon etc.

And then you can get immediately rejected because a lot of us are on SDN! For the rest of you, Tired is being sarcastic. Sarcasm doesn't travel well over the electron.

When you get asked the question, immediately post it to SDN. Start coughing, and the interviewer will go get you glass of water. By the time he gets back, a dozen people will have answered the question. Pick any one of them and read the answer to your interviewer. Done.

 

[NeuResurgens]

These generally aren't looking for a specific "correct" answer. You should study these topics in some detail using the U of W page; this will allow you to gather information about the different issues and the debates surrounding them, with which you can then form your own opinion on the topic. You should be able to reason through the "why" behind your opinions regarding these issues - I think your ability to reason through complex issues with no "correct" answer is much more of interest to the adcoms when they ask you these questions.

 

[Goro]

Why, that's one of the ACGME and AOA core competencies! of course, I think they'll frown on violating the confidentiality of the interview, and outright cheating. My students would probably do a lobotomy on the interviewee right then and there.

"A lot" is a stretch.

Plus, this shows initiative, and the ability to seek out information when you don't have it. If someone pulled this over on you, I hope you would respect how impressive that accomplishment was.

 

[Goro]

Well, yeah, but few schools actually enforce this with a written "I'll keep my mouth shut" contract.

The stuff I share is so generic as to not violate confidentiality.

Are interviews supposed to be confidential? Because that seems to fly in the face of the many "Interview" threads on this board.

(Not being snarky, honest question. I had a very truncated application process, and it was well over a decade ago, so I've forgotten most of it).

 

[panda16]

The Washington Site from above is a great resource, it was used extensively in my Clinical Ethics class.

 

[efle]

Actually, I feel like those kinds of people who blindly apply a single moral framework to every situation they encounter are honestly not very smart. Philosophy is all about argumentation and being able to consider multiple points of view. If I was throwing a couple ethical questions at somebody and they kept giving me the same answer because that's what their moral framework prescribes, then they're really not doing any critical thinking. I'd honestly be a little worried if that's all they took away from a course on moral philosophy.

I'm not sure you understand how axiology works. If your ethics change per situation then you don't have an understanding of what your fundamental intrinsic values are. If I'm utilitarian, there are no cases where I will stop wanting to maximize good, and flexibility and critical thinking is exercised in determining what maximizes good per each case. Nothing is smart or dumb about having the utilitarian moral framework. You can only be dumb in poorly applying it.

 

[efle]

You cheeky bastard

^^this

Oh, and also this dude Kant.

 

[efle]

I think we generally have the same idea. I was describing somebody who didn't understand their fundamental intrinsic values - ie. did not have a strong grasp of their framework qua framework. I've actually seen a lot of kids who act like they have a perfect understanding of ethics after taking one intro course. You throw the trolley problem at them and they say, "Bentham says this!" or "Kant says this!" but the moment you take them into the real world they have no idea how to make a decision and justify it.

Also, regarding utilitarianism, I've always thought the world was too complicated to effectively utilize a utilitarian framework. Too many unknowns. How am I supposed to know where all the utils are?

Oh, a utilitaritopia is totally impossible, agreed. People define utils too differently to make it work even if it could be somehow effectively quantified. But, in some cases there's a clear winner by some definition of good nearly everyone agrees on, and in those cases you need to be ready to break the rules set up as a guideline for what usually aims at utili.

And at least you can try with utili. If you tried to utilize something like Kantian ethics you'd just be telling everyone to bend over and prepare for those not playing by your rules to abuse you

 

[The Milkman]

In 10 interviews I had zero ethical questions. I mean, unless you count the maybe two MMI scenarios. Am I the only one?