Ep 49: How To Prepare For Medical School Interviews in 2026

Dr Tom Forfa (00:00)
Welcome back, everyone, to the Nurses Doing GAMSAT podcast. It’s for nurses, healthcare professionals, science students and future doctors navigating GAMSAT applications, interviews and the path into medicine. I’m Dr Tom, the founder and CEO of ThankFlip GAMSAT, and today I’m joined by Bhakti.

Bhakti (00:18)
Hello.

Dr Tom Forfa (00:19)
Hi, Bhakti.

Bhakti’s our interview lead at ThankFlip GAMSAT. She’s a second-year med student at Notre Dame. She coaches students across things like applications, Casper and interviews, so she’s the perfect person to have this conversation with. Welcome, Bhakti.

Bhakti (00:40)
Thank you for having me. I’m so excited to be here today. I love talking about the interview.

Dr Tom Forfa (00:46)
Yeah, I mean, well, yeah. What was it? Once you said you would—yeah, you do Casper as well. You love both of those because they’re quite similar. But—

Bhakti (00:52)
I love a good tactics test.

Dr Tom Forfa (00:55)
So, yeah, today, if you’ve got an interview, congratulations. We’re talking to you today. You know, there’s a lot to do in a very short period of time, and so we’re going to be covering a lot of ground today. We’re going to go broad, we’re going to go very specific, just to make sure that you know what you need to be doing in the next few days, few hours, few weeks, depending on when your interview is.

Because, Bhakti, some of the boot campers in our programme, like that one—already got their… It was meant to be the ANU one this weekend, right, as of recording?

Bhakti (01:29)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (01:30)
This—

Bhakti (01:30)
Yep, this weekend. And then I think ANU—is it ANU that has two interviews? There is an MMI and a panel.

So it’s just… it’s grind time for some people. I mean, for everyone that’s got an interview, it should be grind time.

Dr Tom Forfa (01:43)
Yeah.

Bhakti (01:44)
For everyone that’s got an interview, it should be grind time.

Dr Tom Forfa (01:47)
It is time to forget everything else and focus on this because this is the thing that’s going to make all the difference.

So we have a few things we want to go through with you guys, and the first one is: “So, I got an interview. What now?”

So, if you’ve just opened up your email from GAMSAT and it says, you know, you’ve got an interview offer, Bhakti, what should we do in the next 24 to 48 hours?

Bhakti (02:16)
So I think the first thing should always be to celebrate. It’s amazing that you’ve gotten an interview. It’s a huge deal, and I really hope that you do take the time to just think about how, you know, big of a journey you’ve kind of done so far.

And, yeah, it’s absolutely awesome that you’ve got an interview offer. Once you’ve done that, that’s when you really need to lock in, right?

And I think one thing to note that we’ll kind of touch on, I think, across the board today is that the interview is not the easy part of the application, which a lot of people actually think. They’re like, “It’s just the interview. You know, you just need to talk and, like, you’re basically already into med school.”

No, you are not.

The interview, at this point for most universities, is about 50% of your application now. So it’s a big, big, big chunk of your application, and it quite literally will make or break whether you get into medical school or not.

So, in the first—

Dr Tom Forfa (03:22)
Yeah, not to scare you guys or anything.

Bhakti (03:34)
And—

Dr Tom Forfa (03:35)
Take it more seriously than you did the GAMSAT, right? It’s worth more.

Bhakti (03:38)
Yeah, absolutely.

Dr Tom Forfa (03:39)
It’s literally worth more for the majority of the universities at this point, but you’ve got far less time to prepare for it.

Bhakti (03:48)
Yeah, absolutely. And I think the first 24 to 48 hours should really involve understanding the purpose of the interview and what you can kind of shape your preparation based on that.

And the purpose of the interview is, so far for most universities—unless you’ve sat the Casper or, you know, some sort of other—

Dr Tom Forfa
Yeah.

Bhakti
—but basically just the Casper—you’ve kind of just been seen based on your academic and reasoning value, right? So your GAMSAT score, your GPA.

And then the interview point is the point at which universities can actually get to see what traits make you a suitable doctor, which is arguably one of the most important things when you do become a doctor. Is, are you actually going to be a good person and know how—

Dr Tom Forfa (04:40)
Yeah.

Bhakti (04:41)
—to, you know, be nice to people?

Obviously, there’s more to the interview than that. But that’s why it’s really important to prepare really well, and, yeah, we’ll kind of touch on how you can get started with that today.

Dr Tom Forfa (06:00)
Yeah. And I like what you said about GPA and GAMSAT, right? That got you here. It got you the interview. But now it doesn’t matter anymore for the interview, right? They’re not looking at your academics, how clever you are.

Whether you’ve done a PhD, whatever, they don’t care. It’s about different skill sets that they’re looking for.

And across the universities, like 80% are kind of the similar things, you know, communication, ethical reasoning, that kind of thing. But then each university has their own twist on it.

And this is about the extent of the information they’ll give you. They’ll, if you’re lucky, they’ll tell you the list of general themes of things that they’re going to look for: communication, reflection, judgement, self-awareness, ethical reasoning, those kinds of things.

Or you can potentially look those up on the university’s website. Or we give those to our students in the programme.

But let’s quickly just talk about why those things are so important. Who cares? Like, so I’m clever, I’m really smart, I’ve done cool things. Why shouldn’t I be a medical student?

Bhakti (07:06)
I think that, in terms of these traits that you’ve spoken about—you know, communication, not being judgemental, self-awareness, ethical reasoning—the… I’m at Notre Dame, and if anyone’s gotten an interview with Notre Dame, one of the big things that we focus on is bioethics and personal and professional development. It’s one of the biggest topics that we cover.

And, you know, when you get into med school, it’s so hard in terms of the content, right? Like, the first day I walked into Year 1, the head of the department was saying that medicine’s like trying to drink out of a fire hose. And I can reassure you that it’s exactly like that.

But, I don’t know—

Dr Tom Forfa (07:57)
Yeah. About six months. Luckily, your mouth grows over time, so you can drink more quickly.

Bhakti (08:03)
But, you know, we get there. I think our tolerance… we just get used to it.

But this content side, like, you know, you’re going to see this content over and over and over again, right? Pneumonia will come up over and over and over again.

And eventually, even if you don’t understand it fully the first time you learn it, over time you will understand the content just by exposure.

But communication, judgement, self-awareness, ethical reasoning—these are skills that are so important to becoming a doctor. I would say that they’re even more important than being super smart and just getting all the content in the first shot, right?

Dr Tom Forfa (08:43)
Yeah. I agree, especially with the evolution of things like AI and robotics and how that’s coming into medicine. The human side—the stuff that’s being examined here in the interview—is going to be ever more important for doctors.

Yeah, so I get what you’re saying there, Bhakti, because the key thing here is that these skills that they’re testing for now is how you will function within the system, within the profession of medicine.

Yes, we’re all clever—everyone who’s getting to this point is—but now it’s like: will you deal with the team, the people, the human side of it, the empathy, the judgement—not just not judging people, but being able to judge a situation—and what’s the best course of action here for the people involved?

What understanding not just the superficial stuff going on, but three layers deep to seeing what is really underneath the surface and what’s the best course of action.

Because essentially, that’s what a doctor is doing. You know, you may have had varying experiences with doctors, but what they’re training us for is to be performing at that high level.

And that’s what they want. Each medical school has their own kind of north star as to who they want—what the kind of ideal medical student and doctor is that they produce. They all have their own little twists and spins, but this is what they’re looking for now.

Chances are, you have it, but showing it is the key here. Getting it out of your heart and your brain and verbalising it, whether it’s to a camera, to an individual, to a panel, however your interview is run.

But nonetheless, Bhakti, why? I mean, there are many strong and capable, academically strong people, but they can still perform poorly. So we kind of started touching on it already. But how can really clever people mess up the interview?

Bhakti (10:53)
So I think that most people that are sitting the interview fall into two categories, right?

There’s one side that are underprepared, so they kind of just think interview prep is just like any other exam. Or they’re like, “Pff, you know, I’ve got, like, a great GPA, I’ve got a great GAMSAT score. How hard can the interview possibly be?”

Dr Tom Forfa (11:15)
No, and I—just to be honest, I was one of those people the first time I did—

Bhakti (11:18)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (11:19)
—I had a UCID interview years ago, MMI, and I walked in there like, “I got all the marks, I got the GPA, I got the experience, I did a little bit of prep,” and I failed.

Failed it.

Bhakti (11:29)
Yeah. And a lot of people do fall into that category, right? Where they’re just a little bit overconfident and, you know, not really… maybe—I think, honestly, I think it just roots from not really understanding what the interview actually is and how to start preparing for it.

So that’s the first category: the underprepared. Don’t really do much work and they kind of just wing it, don’t do well.

The second category is people that are overprepared.

So they understand that the interview is really important, and it may be driven a little bit by the anxiety of it, which naturally there is going to be, but everything that they say is so over-rehearsed, and there’s no flexibility within their answers that are pre-prepared.

And they really strongly stick to these answers that they’ve kind of memorised rather than learning how to think on the spot, which you’re going to have to do when you’re a doctor as well, right?

So both of these people need structure and they need frameworks to be able to, as we’ve kind of said, articulate and show their experiences and their journey into their responses.

But this balance needs to be flexible. Sorry, the use of these structures and frameworks needs to be flexible so that you can apply it to different types of questions and scenarios.

But to achieve this balance, you need practice and you need guided practice.

Dr Tom Forfa (12:59)
Yeah, let’s just pause on the frameworks and the strategies, because the way this evolved was, you know, back in the olden days when I did GAMSAT, when I got through in the dinosaur era, we would just kind of practise back and forth and just kind of wing the answers, try and come up with a good one, and hope it came out really good.

But let’s say even if you got the marking criteria—which I have seen the marking criteria because I’ve been an interviewer—and you memorise the marking criteria, the next year it’s going to be a different question, different scenario, different university, perhaps.

And so that’s going to work against you if you have these kind of overly rehearsed, memorised responses. Or you’re just trying to wing it every time because you don’t know if you’re actually hitting the points.

And so, when I was being the interviewer, looking at the marking criteria, I thought: how can we… what is the essence here? Looking underneath the surface, what are the principles? What are they really looking for? What’s at the core of this? And how can we put that into a replicable—

Bhakti
Mm.

Dr Tom Forfa
—structure?

That’s where the frameworks come in, where you can kind of quickly pull it out and go, “Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang,” go through it, where it’s not rehearsed, but it is sophisticated.

It’s on a topic you’ve never really thought about before, and that’s when you walk out going, “Yes, I nailed that.”

So, yeah, that’s kind of—I mean, your question was around rehearsed answers, but I think I hopefully answered it.

Bhakti (17:59)
Yeah, you did. And I guess we were just talking about curveballs, but, you know, a big part of the interview is common questions.

One of the biggest questions that I get as a tutor from students, but also when I was studying for the interview, this is something, you know, that took me a very long time and I had to chew over to come to my answer, but “Why medicine?” is such a common question that people have.

And, you know, I see people on social media going through how to answer this question. I’m sure that if you’ve got an interview, you’ve kind of gone to Reddit, looked on Instagram, like you’ve done that whole process of looking around and trying to find the answer for this.

But what makes a convincing answer when it comes to “Why medicine?” isn’t something that’s generic or something that you’ve seen on the internet. It really has to come from within you.

Because, you know, Tom, your reason for being in medicine, or going to study medicine, being a doctor, is so different to my reason, is so different to the next person’s, right?

But some things that you should and can avoid are saying basic things, or just superficial things, like, “I love human bio, I did biomed for my undergrad and I really enjoyed it, and I like helping people,” and, you know, whatever.

Which can—I mean, for everyone that’s studying medicine, is inherently true, but it’s not, like, if you actually think about it, probably what’s truly driving you in medicine.

And I think that this question is one that really needs to have that reflective process to understand what your reasoning is behind wanting to become a doctor.

Dr Tom Forfa (19:57)
Yeah. So there are a couple of—so, yeah, you kind of touched on some really important points there, Bhakti.

You don’t want to be overly broad and vague when you’re answering this one, because everyone has a passion for medicine, right? I have a passion for science, for learning. You know, they’re the standard ones.

But when you say reflecting on your reasons, it really has to be a personal connection to it.

And it could be something like you having seen someone suffering through an illness that you wanted to help with, or it could be something like you’ve been inspired by a particular person, doctor or situation, or you want to be able to help in a particular way and you have a reason for that.

You want to really make it personal to your experiences. That’s the first thing that’s important there.

The other thing is the counterintuitive point on this one, and now I know this from being behind the scenes, but it’s also: have you considered what you would do if you don’t get into medicine?

Bhakti (22:48)
Mm. That kind of reminds me, when I was in my undergrad, I was talking to one of my friends who’s a med student at ANU now, and he was telling me that his aunt, when she interviewed—I think back in the day, in her interview, they asked her, “Why medicine?” And she was like—and, like, big warning: do not do this now because it’s not going to get you in.

She was like, “I want to study medicine because it pays really well and I like to travel.” And she got it. But that’s not going to fly now.

Dr Tom Forfa (23:24)
That’s it. No, not these days. No way. No, that’s… well.

Bhakti (23:27)
So if that is your reasoning, you have some serious reflection to do.

Dr Tom Forfa (23:30)
Good. That’s like a one out of ten. That’s one for showing up.

Yeah, we asked this question before people join our boot camp programme, and we’ve had some doozies, let me tell you. There’s one that kind of sticks in my mind and kind of scared me a little bit. The guy goes, “I like the power of being able to decide people’s futures.”

I’m like, “I’m not going to help you by—”

Bhakti (23:58)
That’s a crazy thing to say. I really hope that—

Dr Tom Forfa (24:00)
That’s like a… I was like, “This is like a sociopath right here.”

But no, most people are not there. Most people will be like 80% of the way there with their answer.

Bhakti (24:10)
Mm-hmm.

Dr Tom Forfa (24:12)
80% is… you may as well be a fail at this point, because the markers are really nitpicking.

Bhakti (24:21)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (24:21)
Because everybody there—they want to do well, they’re intelligent, they’re probably prepared. And so it’s between nines and tens that we’re giving, right? We’re really trying to find gaps in the answers because the calibre of people is so high.

Bhakti (24:41)
Mm. And this is especially true for Notre Dame Sydney and Fremantle, because they’ve kind of already weeded out those kinds of people with the Casper. And most people that get an interview will have, like, a third or fourth quartile.

So you are really competing with these people that have, like—they’re like 90% there.

Dr Tom Forfa (25:01)
Yeah.

Bhakti (25:02)
Yeah, very strong candidates.

Dr Tom Forfa (25:05)
Yeah. Again, not to scare you guys, but just to emphasise that this requires a high level of preparation and nuance to what you’re doing. Your standard kind of approaches aren’t going to help you.

And this particularly applies to nurses and healthcare professionals, because one of the downsides that I’ve found with working with a lot of nurses, or downsides for their interviews, is they come with these great experiences in healthcare, but they think that’s enough.

They’re like, “Hey, look, I’ve done tons of interviews as a nurse and a healthcare professional. Just get me in the interview, I’m going to nail this thing.”

It’s a different interview. This isn’t a job interview, right? It’s got some of the teamwork questions and communication questions, but then you’ve got the ethical scenarios and kind of medicine-specific questions.

If you’ve seen the questions, you’ll see it’s not your standard interview. And having experience, I mean, again, there’s a lot of healthcare professionals going through the GAMSAT, especially if you’re at Deakin, right? Going for Deakin like that, and Wollongong—a large, large majority there.

So you’ve got to really stand out from the crowd. And that confidence is fantastic. Confidence on its own isn’t on the marking criteria, but confidence allows you to speak clearly, hopefully, and directly. But then you need to fill in those answers in an effective way.

Yeah, I think that’s kind of the big point there. But then, yeah, the ones that most people struggle with are the ethical scenarios.

Bhakti (26:50)
Yeah. Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (26:51)
So let’s chat about those, because they’re the ones that people have the biggest questions about. They are generally the most difficult questions.

Bhakti (27:00)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (27:01)
Tell me a bit more about those.

Bhakti (27:05)
I think—I mean, I do agree that these questions are very difficult. You know, we’ve just started running some of the classes in our interview boot camp, and I think that ethical scenarios are the ones where I really have to workshop with the students and really emphasise the importance of these frameworks to get them to that perfect answer.

And a lot of them are very quickly able to get there with these frameworks.

But I think one of the things that is really important with ethical scenarios is to firstly just know that there isn’t one right answer, right?

And I think a lot of people go into these ethical scenarios where—you know, I’ll use the example of the classic question where there’s a 90-year-old guy in the emergency department needing a liver, and then there’s a mum that needs a liver, but she drinks and she’s younger, and, you know, whatever. There’s more to it, but there are lots of different things that you need to think about in that.

And I think just really knowing that there’s no right or wrong, but it’s more about explaining your reasoning behind any sort of conclusion that you come to is what they’re actually looking for. Like, what’s your thought process behind what you think about?

Because medicine’s not black and white. It’s not, “Yeah, I’m just going to do this and do that, and, you know, go home after that.” There are so many things that you need to think about—biopsychosocial things, family, cultural background. There are so many different things that come into making a decision about someone’s health.

And I think these ethical scenarios do a really good job of showing that in the interview. And that’s what they’re trying to see: can you actually deal with considering different stakeholders within a scenario? Or dealing with not having information about something? Or competing priorities and consequences that you might have to face from your decision as well?

So, yeah, I think it—I agree, it’s very complicated. But again, this is by far one of the biggest examples of where structure and frameworks are so important. And without those, it’s really hard to know which direction to take your response in. And oftentimes, people can end up going in the wrong direction.

Dr Tom Forfa (34:01)
Yeah.

Cool. So then we talked about a few different types of questions. We talked about the “Why medicine?” We talked about the ethical scenarios. And then we’ve got more of what we call the direct kind of behavioural questions.

So let’s talk about those for a little bit, Bhakti.

Bhakti (34:28)
So, in terms of what they’re kind of testing, they kind of are looking more for experience, right? What have you done to get to this point?

Talking about things like failure, conflict, leadership, how you react to feedback, resilience, your weaknesses.

For these sorts of situations, it’s really such an amazing opportunity to showcase your experiences and how they have shaped you to get to this point. But it’s very easy to do it wrong as well.

Dr Tom Forfa (35:12)
Okay.

Bhakti (35:13)
As with all things in medicine.

But I think that, for example, one of the traps that people fall into is trying to say what they think the marker is looking for, or what will make them seem like a really amazing candidate, rather than actually doing that reflective process that they’re after.

So, for example, talking about what’s your biggest weakness, which is a very common question, saying something like, “I’m just a perfectionist, and I just can’t stop working really hard, and, you know, I’m just such a good student. It’s so hard.”

And it’s like, okay, it’s very transparent that you’re not actually reflecting on what your weaknesses are there, but rather you’re trying to say something artificial to create a certain perception of you.

And I think that’s not the point of these questions.

And for something like, you know, what your weaknesses are, it’s similar to—because I also do Section 2 tutoring. Sorry, I also—I’m a Section 2 tutor in the boot camp. And that also, if you’ve written essays for Section 2, involves a very reflective process, especially for the Task B essays, right?

And it’s similar here, where you don’t want to fall into the trap of trying to say something just for the sake of it, or say something because you think that’s what the markers are looking for, but really reflecting on what your weaknesses are.

But also showing that you’re aware of those weaknesses, that you’re doing something about them as well, and that you have done something about them.

Yeah, and I think that’s really important.

Dr Tom Forfa (37:02)
Yeah, I think that’s a great point, and it shows your level of insight and ability to reflect upon yourself.

And as doctors, we have to do that because people’s lives are at stake. You know, you’ve got the classic example of a doctor who thinks that they don’t need to learn anything more because they know everything and they’re brilliant at what they do. And questioning that questions their ego.

Or they don’t have the ability to go, “No, actually, things have progressed in this field, in this area, and I need to get better here. Or I made a mistake here; these were the consequences. I need to fix that.”

Otherwise, we kind of ignore that, pretend it’s not there, and people suffer. So we can’t have that.

And so in medicine, that reflective process, that level of personal insight, is super important. And that’s what this reflects: your weaknesses.

“I’m a perfectionist.” Bullshit. Like, everyone kind of sees—anyone who is a few years ahead just sees right through that kind of stuff, and they’re like, “Not this person.”

Bhakti (38:08)
Come on, man.

Dr Tom Forfa (38:11)
Then you don’t want to obviously go overboard with this, but it’s about going, “All right, so one of my weaknesses has been my ability to…”, you know, whatever it is for you.

“And that became a problem in this situation. And then I acknowledged it, and I’ve been taking these steps to address it since. And here’s how I’ve improved.”

Right? That is like, “Wow, this person is mature. I can work with this person. I can trust this person that they’re going to do the right things.” And, you know, they’re one step closer to becoming a doctor.

Bhakti (38:48)
Yeah, absolutely.

Dr Tom Forfa (38:48)
And this works across things like teamwork and communication skills. Like, where have you had conflict in a team? And being able to communicate your responsibilities in that problem, how you acknowledged those and how you fixed those.

And I think that is the difference between someone talking shit on the internet versus someone becoming a doctor and a medical student, right?

It’s the whole, “I’m right,” a rant about how someone else was wrong and how they played no part in the problem, versus actually, “I contributed to this, they contributed to this, but here’s the action that I took to try and improve it from my point of view. And here’s what I did to improve myself, and here are the outcomes that we had.”

Bhakti (39:38)
Yeah.

And that humility is so important, not just in the interview, where you are able to reflect on your weaknesses and receive feedback, but also, like, med school is just a really long humiliation ritual, right? Like, you’re always just getting beaten down by things.

But I think that if you don’t have humility and resilience and an open mind to learning more, it becomes very hard to keep going.

Dr Tom Forfa (40:10)
Yeah.

Bhakti (40:10)
I think, like, same with the GAMSAT, same with GPA, same with the interview. These skills aren’t just to pass the interview or to get to the next stage in your journey. These skills that you’re building now are going to help you for the rest of your career.

So I think they’re really important.

Dr Tom Forfa (40:30)
Yeah. And so the key here is the practice and the feedback from people who know what they’re talking about, so that you do hit the right points and you are genuine about the whole process.

And, you know, there is something to be said about having a bit of a bank of experiences that you have reflected on and you’ve kind of built out in your mind as potential examples that you can pull on.

Not scripted, but being comfortable having discussed it and being able to reflect on it and bring it up in an interview where it’s important.

Bhakti (41:15)
And I actually touched on this in the last—we call them the mini mocks—when we practise applying these structures and going through questions with the boot campers.

And I was talking to some of the boot campers last class about this. When I was doing the interview, and this is something that I think everyone should do, I had a piece of paper and I just wrote out every single thing that I’d done, from work to volunteering, uni, any projects that I’d done, any research, every single thing that I’d done, awards, whatever it is, on a piece of paper.

And then I branched out from there and I wrote, “What trait can this example be used for?”

So, you know, in work, I had leadership, teamwork, conflict. In uni, I had teamwork, conflict, public speaking, whatever it is.

And I think that’s a really good way to not use your experiences in a scripted way, but because I know that now, okay, in my head, I know that this job that I did plus, you know, a project that I ran can be examples that I can use for leadership.

If I get a question like that, I can very easily weave that into the answer.

So I think that everyone should do something like that, where they are looking back on their experiences and looking at, okay, where can I apply this experience in terms of what trait?

Dr Tom Forfa (42:41)
Yeah. And then it becomes about practising this and making sure that you’re on the right path.

Because this is the key, right? A lot of people think about their answers, but until you’ve verbalised it, that’s step one.

You know, verbalising it and then getting feedback on it and then changing your answers based on that feedback and practising that again is the key.

And that’s like Bhakti mentioned the mini mocks. That’s what those are.

So, you know, there’s a mock interview—we all know what that is—where it’s a one-off event where you pretend it’s a real interview, then you get feedback at the end, which we do with our boot campers closer towards the interview.

But in the lead-up to that, we do mini versions twice a week, where we get on the group call and we all practise and get feedback.

And we learn from our own answers but also from everybody else’s, which just multiplies the growth and the improvement, because you hear things that you wouldn’t have otherwise heard if it was just you doing it with AI or you and a mate.

And you get the kind of feedback that you need.

So then being able to go through that process multiple times a week is where you very quickly, over a short period of time, make drastic improvements in your skills around this.

Bhakti (43:58)
Yeah.

Yeah. And I love everyone in the interview boot camp. I feel like every time after I finish a mini mock, I message Tom and I’m just like, “My God, I love this shit so much. They’re so cute. I just love them all.”

And, like, I’ve only done—we’ve only just started. Interview offers just came out. We’ve already run a couple of mini mocks, and the improvement is just—I just think that by the time they sit their interview, they’re just going to be, like, killing it, because that’s already—

No. Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (44:08)
Yeah. And they are. They’re fantastic. They’re fantastic.

Bhakti (44:12)
I love them.

Dr Tom Forfa (44:29)
Yeah. And this is because they’re not making it up. We’re not kind of just winging it with a mate, right?

There’s a specific direction, a process, a structure, a framework, a thought process and a path that you’re going down. And the more you do it, the further you go.

But let’s talk about this. Let’s talk about the flip side of this, Bhakti.

What happens if you bomb a station in your MMI, or even in a panel, if you’re doing that? If you bomb an answer?

Bhakti (44:54)
Mm. Yeah.

I think that it’s very easy to panic in this situation. And I’m not going to say, “Guys, just don’t panic, it’s fine,” because you will, right?

And I think that that’s the first step: just accept that it is going to be stressful. And you’re not going to feel—and chances are that you probably will feel like you bombed a station even if you didn’t.

So I think it goes two ways, right?

If you’re sitting at an MMI, then you really just need to forget about the last station and move on to the next one.

But if you’re, like, mid-answer and you mess up, you just need to recover. Take a moment to pause, collect your thoughts and then start again or continue from where you left off, right?

Dr Tom Forfa (45:41)
Yeah. I want to start again. I’d continue off. I kind of just continue—yeah, pause, think. Yeah, pause, think, and then continue with a better response.

But yeah, with the MMIs, one station—the way that works is either it’s digital or it’s physical, in rooms, but each station is different. There’s a different interviewer or a different set of questions, and they’re not related. They don’t speak to each other, right?

They just mark you on that specific station.

Bhakti (46:47)
Yeah. And also, Tom, like you’ve done panel interviews before, and I just kind of want to reassure everyone that people mess up and you won’t be the only one on the day that’s messed up.

And the panel interviewers know that it’s a very stressful place to be. So even if you do mess up and you’re in a panel interview, it is sort of expected. But the recovery process is what you really need to practise—that you can jump back and bounce back.

Dr Tom Forfa (47:18)
Yeah.

I wouldn’t be making a big deal of it if it’s mid-answer. Don’t go, “I’m sorry, can I start again?”

No, no. Just go, pause, think, keep going, right? Don’t waste time. Don’t ask for forgiveness or anything. Just keep going and hopefully improve with the second attempt or the continued attempt.

Cool. All right. And so then, the final days or the final week before the interview.

You know, the funny thing with the interviews is, depending on which uni you’ve got, you might have days, you might have weeks before the interview. Or it might even be months; maybe they’re not even released.

I think Flinders, they hadn’t released them at this point, so it might be a little while away.

But if it’s in the immediate lead-up, what should we be doing, Bhakti?

Bhakti (48:17)
So this actually might be a couple of people right now that have, like, a couple of days left before the interview.

I think practice is really important. Having those frameworks is really important.

And I really urge that if you are someone that has, like, a couple of days to a week, whatever it is, for your interview, and you’ve kind of just frozen and you’re not really sure what to do, reach out to us.

Because I think that it’s really important that you, at the very least, are able to build some sort of structure and have some sort of structured, guided practice over the last couple of days that you have.

And I don’t want you to think that, “I’ve only got four days,” or, “I’ve only got a week left, there’s nothing I can do now.”

Because, as I said, within a couple of days, people in our boot camp have made so much progress.

So it’s not about, “I haven’t had months of practice because no one really has.” It’s just about that repetition and that structure that you really need to focus on over the next couple of days.

Dr Tom Forfa (49:27)
Yeah. It’s like trying to come up with the recipe for a delicious cake yourself—

Bhakti (49:32)
Mm.

Dr Tom Forfa (49:33)
—or being given one to follow. Yeah. Which one is going to lead to a delicious cake more quickly?

Right. So if you’re scratching your head about how to go from zero to a hundred, or maybe you’re trying to get that last 10%, getting that formula, that recipe, can make all the difference, and you can move very quickly with the right approach.

So, yeah, reach out in that situation.

And then post-interview, what happens generally speaking, Bhakti?

Bhakti (50:08)
Number one: just don’t go on Reddit. Don’t go on Reddit. Don’t go on Instagram. Don’t go talk to other people that have also sat an interview.

Dr Tom Forfa (50:16)
There’s so many people just talking shit, you know? They’re like, “I did this, I did that, that was great.”

And then the other end is other people feeling sorry for themselves, like—

Bhakti (50:25)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (50:26)
Man—

Bhakti (50:26)
You just don’t know. It’s really hard to have a good understanding of how you went because I think everyone walks out thinking that they did crap.

Dr Tom Forfa (50:40)
Not everyone. Let me tell you, I’ve spoken to some people like, “I nailed it, Tom. I nailed it.” But the results speak differently.

Bhakti (50:46)
Yeah. But, like, just don’t overanalyse what you said. Don’t overthink, you know, what you did.

I think that you’ve given it your best shot, as best you could have. And I guess, yeah, it’s like now it’s just time to kick back and relax and wait for—

Dr Tom Forfa (51:06)
Well, honestly, even before that, what—

Dr Tom Forfa (51:29)
—so that you can then relax and kick back and just everything’s done at that point.

Like, honestly, that’s it.

You’ve done everything you can. You’ve tried, you’ve done it all, and now you just have to wait and see what happens. In late—mid to late November, that’s when the results come out.

Bhakti (51:48)
Yeah. It’s just a very long waiting game.

Dr Tom Forfa (51:52)
Yeah. Well, at that point you’ve got to focus on uni, or go travelling, or whatever you want to do. Go to work.

Some people might be doing the GAMSAT—or unlikely, but you might be doing the GAMSAT again. Well, actually, you’ll be doing it at the same time as the interview prep.

That would be difficult.

But if you are doing the GAMSAT again because you thought you’d increase your score, focus on your interview prep as a priority over GAMSAT. Because you’re like this close to getting in versus GAMSAT’s further away.

So I’d be focusing on that.

But, yeah, after the interview, write down your reflections. If you want, send us the questions that you got. We’d love to see them.

And, yeah, then it’s just a waiting game.

Bhakti (52:36)
Yeah. Awesome.

Dr Tom Forfa (52:39)
All right. Are we going to do the rapid-fire myths? Or have we addressed those?

Bhakti (52:42)
I guess we can just rattle them off. I think we have kind of addressed some of them, but I don’t know.

We spoke about nurses automatically having an advantage. I think that’s a myth.

I think that even if you—you know, I’ll use myself as an example. I went from high school, undergrad, med school. I had no healthcare experience really, or, you know, just uni life or work experience in the real world.

And I don’t think that it’s about that or specific healthcare experience. They’re not expecting you to basically be a doctor before you get into medical school.

Yeah. So it’s all about those structures and frameworks and how you articulate.

Dr Tom Forfa (53:21)
Yeah. I agree. It can potentially be, just like having any other experiences, an advantage if you know how to work it, how to use it, but it’s not automatically one.

Bhakti (53:34)
Mm. Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (53:36)
The next one is, “You should memorise ‘Why medicine?’”

I think we’ve kind of killed that one.

You shouldn’t memorise “Why medicine?” You should know how to answer it and have a great, personalised, specific, well-thought-out, well-considered, maturely considered answer that you can quickly and confidently say.

But if it’s just memorised, it doesn’t come across well. And again, the markers are nitpicking.

Bhakti (54:01)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (54:03)
“Longer answers score better.” Sorry, I cut you off there, buddy.

Bhakti (54:06)
So I feel like there’s a thin line between having a long answer and just waffling.

So, again, structures and frameworks, even if, like, it’s—

Dr Tom Forfa (54:13)
Yeah, and this will depend on the format of the interview as well.

Like, in an MMI, dude, long answers are going to kill you. You’ve got to be—

Bhakti (54:20)
Yes.

Dr Tom Forfa (54:21)
—to the point. You’ve got to get the really juicy bits out quickly.

But in a panel, you’ve got the time to kind of go on tangents and have a chat, in which case it may work in your favour.

But again, you’ve got to answer the question and show your sophistication rather than just rambling on a point.

Bhakti (54:44)
“One station ruins your interview.” I feel like we’ve just covered that. No, it doesn’t.

Dr Tom Forfa (54:48)
Yeah.

Bhakti (54:50)
“Introverts are disadvantaged.”

It can be hard as an interview to, you know, be in a panel—or did I say it can be hard as an interview? I meant introvert. Yeah, I did.

Dr Tom Forfa (55:04)
Yeah, yeah. I was going to let it go. That’s fine. We all know what you meant: introvert.

You fasted yesterday. So, if you guys don’t know, Bhakti did a full-day fast yesterday and so she’s just started eating. So her brain’s not there.

That’s another tip: don’t fast before your interview. Or on the day of it, yeah. Normal habits on the day. No—

Bhakti (55:21)
Yeah.

Dr Tom Forfa (55:27)
—extra caffeine that morning to give you extra talking speed. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Bhakti (55:33)
Stock-standard day.

Dr Tom Forfa (55:33)
The usual. That’s it.

Bhakti (55:36)
Yeah, introverts don’t necessarily have a disadvantage, but I think that in terms of workshopping their way of presenting themselves is something that you might struggle with.

But we have ways that we address that. Like, you know, I’m an introvert as well, and Tom, I think you are as well.

But, you know, it’s different when you’re trying to articulate your experiences. And I personally found that having frameworks and structures really helped with this because I was focused on my response and using those frameworks rather than, “I’m talking to a camera,” or, “I’m in a panel,” or whatever it is.

Dr Tom Forfa (56:20)
I’d add to that: having a methodology to bring out your best self.

It’s not, “Hey, it’s there, it’s on them to get to know me.” It’s rather the other way around, where it’s on you to project you at your best and how to build that rapport quickly, whether it’s with a human being in person, a human being over a camera, or even if it’s just talking to the camera.

For some of the medical schools, you’re talking to a camera, and so you need to build that rapport with the person who’s going to watch that later.

So, yeah, there are methods to addressing that.

And finally, “You need to know every current health issue.” What do you think of that?

Bhakti (57:07)
I think it’s important to know some of them, especially with Indigenous health and rural health. I think it is really important to know about common things.

I don’t think that you need to know about really niche things. Just know the common or, like, top five most common diseases in Australia or in the area that you’re applying to, whatever it is, to show that you do have an understanding of public health as well.

Dr Tom Forfa (57:39)
Yeah, yeah, I’d agree. And you need to know it to a deep level and be able to confidently talk about that when asked.

Some of the medical schools regularly bring that up because public health is an important value that they have.

Awesome. All right, so you guys have a number of things there that you need to work on.

If that’s enough for you, cool. If you want to go deeper and get our help, then go to the links in the show notes and reach out to us about our interview boot camp.

Even a few days in the interview boot camp is going to make all the difference. But the sooner you join, obviously, the better.

And yeah, then you’ll be working with me, Bhakti and our team, and our methodology to help you nail the interview and cross this final hoop before you live the life of a med student.

So, thank you, Bhakti, for—

Bhakti (58:47)
Yeah. Thank you.

Dr Tom Forfa (58:49)
—for guiding us through. Hope you get your energy back throughout the day.

Bhakti (58:53)
Mm-hmm.

Dr Tom Forfa (58:56)
And all the best in your interviews, everyone.