The MMI interview stage of the application process can be very daunting to many. For starters, unless you are applying to an
Australian medical school that requires a portfolio (Notre Dame or Wollongong), the MMI is the most subjective component of your application, so it can be hard to predict what the examiners are looking for. Secondly, the interview has become more heavily weighted in recent years, making it more important that you do well in the interview. Thirdly, most medical school interviews are in the multiple mini interview (MMI) format, which can be daunting in itself if you have never had an MMI interview before.
In this blog post I will talk about my MMI experience in general terms only. Please note that I did my interview pre-COVID when all interviews were face-to-face rather than online as many interviews are today. Also, please note that my university (like many others) required me to sign a non-disclosure agreement, so I cannot talk about the specifics of my interview. Hopefully, however, many of the points that I will discuss here, such as preparation for the day and how to wind down afterwards, will still be relevant to the current interview format.
Before the MMI Interview
Getting my MMI interview offer was very exciting. I was nervous, though, because I’ve always been one of those students that’s been better at the written stuff than the practical stuff. I was fortunate in that I had a very high
GAMSAT score and GPA, so that took the pressure off me considerably, but I still wanted to make sure that I didn’t bomb the interview!
To be honest, I didn’t really have a structured approach to preparing for the interview. I signed up for various free webinars and seminars and made the most of those. I also did a practise session with a doctor working in the department that I did my Honours year with. To make sure that I had at least a basic understanding of topical public health issues, I watched some videos and read articles about them. However, I know that I did have the luxury of having had a good GAMSAT and GPA going in. Many people who don’t have that luxury need to prepare a lot more. I know someone who treated their interview preparation like a full-time job. Those who need some expert help in preparing for the medical school interview might want to consider signing up for a specialised course such as
GradReady’s InterviewReady MMI Course, where you will receive a full refund if you don’t receive an interview offer.
Leading up to the interview, I also made sure to read my offer letter carefully. My MMI interview offer letter provided a lot more information about what to expect. Make sure you read yours carefully too! As well as providing university-specific details about the interview (I can’t reveal mine here due to the non-disclosure agreement, and the interview has likely changed anyway due to COVID), your offer letter will also give you important logistical information. Use this information well! Since mine was a face-to-face interview, I made sure to do a dry run a week or two before my interview date to make sure I knew how to get there. If yours is a video interview, it might be worth checking to see if there’s a demo available, and if so, to play around with the demo to make sure that the software works on your computer. We’ve also written a blog article on
5 Tips to Help You Ace the MMI Interviews, which you might find helpful.
During the MMI Interview
As stated previously, I can’t really tell you much about the MMI interview as I was required to sign a non-disclosure agreement. Most if not all universities require candidates to sign a non-disclosure agreement, so you won’t get much out of other students either. However, I can talk about MMIs in very general terms.
If you’re not familiar with MMIs, here’s a brief explanation: candidates rotate between 8-10 stations and either answer questions or complete a task at each station. We cover the MMI format in more detail in many other posts on this blog, as well as on our
GAMSAT to Med School Podcast.
I was quite anxious before the MMI, though in my case, I think my anxiety wasn’t so much due to the MMI, but more due to having to do an interview at all. One of the good things about the MMI format, however, is that if you mess up at one station, it won’t affect your scores at any other station. Therefore, you can walk out and start the next station with a clean slate. Secondly, the themes between stations can be quite varied, so it can actually be somewhat fun to see what the next station’s theme will be! (I only wish I carried this attitude towards my medical school OSCEs…)
After the MMI Interview
After the MMI, there were times when I’d remember something I did during the interview that wasn’t quite right, like perhaps there was a question I could have answered better, or perhaps I spent too much time on one question at the expense of another. However, being a clarinet player, I know that this is a normal reaction to any kind of performance. I think the human mind is somewhat wired to focusing on every mistake during a performance when adrenaline is high, whereas the audience on the other side only see the big picture and may not have even noticed the mistakes.
My personal experience is that not a whole lot can be done to stop my mind from doing what it does best (ruminating over minutiae), so when I’m waiting for results, I try to keep myself distracted. When I was applying for medicine, I was undertaking an Honours year, so I tried to keep myself busy by writing up my thesis and preparing my poster presentation. Eventually, the results came, and the rest is history!
Conclusion
Even though my MMI experience will likely be very different to yours, hopefully this blog post has offered up enough insights that might be relevant to your MMI interview as well. Interviews can be daunting, but hopefully with a little preparation and knowledge of what to expect, interview day will go smoothly for you, and you’ll be able to secure yourself a place in a medical school!
If you’re looking for more information about the pathways to medicine available to you in order to become a doctor in Australia, check out our guide on
Medical Pathways in Australia.
