Queen's University Belfast Medicine Interview Questions
General Interview Information
Interview Format
Queen’s University Belfast uses Multiple-mini interviews to test for the desired competencies for entry into their MBBS programme. The interview has nine stations in total, with three of these as ‘rest’ stations. You are given one minute to prepare for the station and five minutes at the station itself to complete the task/answer questions. The stations focus on the following non-cognitive competencies:
COVID-19 Update for 2021
In 2021, all Belfast’s MMIs will take place online. Interviews will be spread over an extended period of time due to it being harder to interview a high number of students on a single day. Some stations will be changed from their normal MMI.
Before the Interview
During the Interview
Recent MMI Stations
General/Personal Statement Station: This station will focus on aspects of your personal statement and background. Assume that your assessor has not read your personal statement and that you will need to give them an account of what it contains as well as other typical medicine interview questions. Questions may be as follows:
Role play Station: You will be given a scenario, which you will act out with a trained actor. These stations are designed to test your communication skills and your empathy towards others. In order to succeed in these stations, practice implementing ‘The 6 Stages of MMI Role Play’. Recent role play scenarios include the following:
Ethical Dilemma: These situations often take the format of a semi-structured interview with the assessor and again, assess multiple competencies. Ensure that you can apply the four pillars of ethics to the scenario where relevant, as well as recalling the BlackStone Tutors ‘2 Sorts, 2 Sides’ approach. Recent ethical scenarios have included the following:
Communication Station – You are given a scenario and must consider what options you have to deal with the situation. Ensure that you use the ‘7 Stages of MMI Communication Stations’ in approaching these stations. Recent station examples include the following:
Science/Medicine Station: While assessors do not expect you to have complete knowledge of the diagnostic procedures involved in patient care or for specific diseases, this station does reflect your interest in the field and ability to explore and solve problems/scenarios. For example:
Medicine Interview Mark Schemes
Click Here (Available to MMI Interview Course Attendees)
Queen’s University Belfast uses Multiple-mini interviews to test for the desired competencies for entry into their MBBS programme. The interview has nine stations in total, with three of these as ‘rest’ stations. You are given one minute to prepare for the station and five minutes at the station itself to complete the task/answer questions. The stations focus on the following non-cognitive competencies:
- Empathy
- Problem-solving
- Moral reasoning
- Communication Skills
COVID-19 Update for 2021
In 2021, all Belfast’s MMIs will take place online. Interviews will be spread over an extended period of time due to it being harder to interview a high number of students on a single day. Some stations will be changed from their normal MMI.
Before the Interview
- Know your personal statement well and be prepared to discuss any aspect of it in detail.
- Know the curriculum of the course well and how it will benefit you as a prospective student.
- Do thorough research on the medical school itself and know what makes you want to spend the next five years living and studying there, for example, the early clinical experiences in years 1 and 2, living cost etc.
- Review the four pillars of medical ethics! These will help you think of both 'for' and 'against' arguments for many scenarios.
- Practice discussing ethical scenarios with friends, family and MMI specialists.
During the Interview
- As with any interview, it is all about managing the interviewer’s perception of you and painting yourself in the best light possible. You will be given one minute outside the interview room to read the instructions and consider how you will approach the scenario. Ask yourself what competencies the scenario might be trying to test. If it is a problem you are faced with, ask yourself what steps you would take to solve the problem, your available options. Discuss these with the assessor so that they can appreciate your decision-making processes.
- Remember that each station carries equal marks and that if you under perform in one station, you have lots of others in which to make up marks.
Recent MMI Stations
General/Personal Statement Station: This station will focus on aspects of your personal statement and background. Assume that your assessor has not read your personal statement and that you will need to give them an account of what it contains as well as other typical medicine interview questions. Questions may be as follows:
- Why Queens University Belfast?
- Why medicine?
- Tell me what you learned from your work experience at...
- Give the advantages of disadvantages of working in a group or individually. Which do you prefer? And why?
Role play Station: You will be given a scenario, which you will act out with a trained actor. These stations are designed to test your communication skills and your empathy towards others. In order to succeed in these stations, practice implementing ‘The 6 Stages of MMI Role Play’. Recent role play scenarios include the following:
- You are a first-year medical student. On your way home from class, you reach a bus stop and see, a classmate sitting there looking glum, obviously upset. You do not know their name. Demonstrate how you would approach this situation. Your classmate will be waiting at the bus stop when you enter the station.
- Additional MMI Role Play Scenarios (from a range of UK Medical Schools) can be found in the MMI Question Bank.
Ethical Dilemma: These situations often take the format of a semi-structured interview with the assessor and again, assess multiple competencies. Ensure that you can apply the four pillars of ethics to the scenario where relevant, as well as recalling the BlackStone Tutors ‘2 Sorts, 2 Sides’ approach. Recent ethical scenarios have included the following:
- Your mother rings you and asks you to come round and help with a significant family decision. Her 70-year-old father has been diagnosed with a condition that will kill him sometime in the next five years. He can have a procedure that will correct the disease and not leave him with any long-term problems, but the procedure has a 10% mortality rate. He wants to have the procedure, but your mother is not in favour of it. How would you help mediate this issue?
- You are a junior doctor and found out that a senior staff/doctor did something which you know is wrong and might harm the patients. What would you do?
Communication Station – You are given a scenario and must consider what options you have to deal with the situation. Ensure that you use the ‘7 Stages of MMI Communication Stations’ in approaching these stations. Recent station examples include the following:
- You are a first-year medical student living in a student house with other students enrolled in a variety of courses. The neighbours have complained about noise coming from your house. What options do you have to deal with this situation?
- A student in your tutorial group is not doing his/her job for an assignment which you are supposed to complete as a group. What would you do?
Science/Medicine Station: While assessors do not expect you to have complete knowledge of the diagnostic procedures involved in patient care or for specific diseases, this station does reflect your interest in the field and ability to explore and solve problems/scenarios. For example:
- You are a GP and suspected a patient of yours has lung cancer after looking at his/her X-ray film. What would you do?
- Additional example questions with model answers are available in the MMI Question Bank.
Medicine Interview Mark Schemes
Click Here (Available to MMI Interview Course Attendees)