Medical and Dental School Interviews: Preparing for your MMI

I just completed a Mock Interview Service with a lovely client who was about to face his first MMI-style interview. Although the majority of medical and dental school interviews are still traditional, some institutions utilize a multiple mini interview (MMI) platform. The MMI is a format that uses several timed stations to assess applicants' interpersonal skills and judgment.

A few things to note about MMI interview questions:

1) They are not always medically-related. You may be asked to manage an everyday problem (e.g. a disagreement at the supermarket).

2) They are not always situational. You need to be prepared for conventional questions (e.g. what are your three greatest strengths?).

3) Schools are trying to assess whether you can skillfully employ important techniques and demonstrate professionalism. Underlying topics might include your ability to offer effective counseling, your understanding of patient-doctor confidentiality, an ability to diffuse a heated situation, a capacity to admit wrongdoing, or reporting an impaired supervisor.

4) Make sure to read the school's description of their MMI format: How many minutes do you have to prepare with the prompt, how long are the stations, are there role-play scenarios? Knowing what the structure is will help decrease stress. 

It's important that you practice MMI questions before you go to your medical or dental school interview. Even if you have excellent social skills, there are techniques you should hone to expertly manage the challenging MMI format.

Time to Take a Reading Break

I hope each of you has a moment of downtime over this holiday season. One of the ways I relax is with a good book. Here's a piece I wrote for Student Doctor Network regarding great books for doctors in training.  

In addition to the list, I want to add another strong recommendation: Pulitzer Prize Finalist Paul Kalanithi's When Breath Becomes Air. Get ready to cry your eyes out, while appreciating beautiful prose and insightful content. Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with metastatic lung cancer when he was a senior neurosurgery resident at Stanford. He chronicles his short life in a book that's hard to put down. 

Scholarships for Prehealth Students

Student Doctor Network (SDN) just announced their 2026 scholarship for prehealth students who are committed to under-resourced communities as future professionals. SDN is awarding up to four $2500 grants; eligibility requirements include having graduated from high school in a medically underserved area or having received fee assistance; applying to medical, dental, pharmacy, or other doctoral health programs; and being a US citizen or permanent resident.

Here's a link with more details regarding eligibility, timeline, and the application process.

Please note: Applicants demonstrating financial hardship through a current AAMC Fee Assistance Program grant may be considered for reduced rates for Insider services. Please contact me for more information. 

Being Valued is Undervalued

Back in 2022, an interesting JAMA study called "Trends in Clinician Burnout With Associated Mitigating and Aggravating Factors During the COVID-19 Pandemic" came out. The survey reflected responses from over 20,000 US clinicians and demonstrated that chaotic workplaces and lack of control of workload were associated with higher burnout (think emergency departments or a poorly run, overscheduled clinic), while efficient teamwork and feeling valued were associated with lower burnout. 

People sometimes pay lip service to the importance of being appreciated, but this study supports its significance.

Consider this study's results when making decisions about what field to choose, where to train, and what position to take after residency. Here's the article.

AAMC Report on Residents 2025

Yearly, the Association of American Medical Colleges publishes a report with residency statistics. The 2025 edition has some interesting data:

1. In 2024, women accounted for 50.2% of residents and fellows, representing a persistent increase that has been noted over the past years.
2. Only approximately 29.4% of medical students list the same specialty preference on their graduation questionnaire as they did on their matriculating student questionnaire.
3. US osteopathic (DO) seniors saw a 92.6% PGY-1 Match rate, the highest ever.

You can find more information here.

Two of my Very Talented Friends - Together

I want to recommend a great podcast episode: On her Visible Voices Podcast, my pal and former resident Dr. Resa Lewiss recently conducted a fantastic interview with another friend and former resident Dr. Shan Liu.  

Resa co-authored the book "MicroSkills: Small Actions, Big Impact" and launched Visible Voices in 2020. Shan, who is on faculty at Harvard, wrote the children's book Masked Hero about her great-grandfather Wu Lien-teh who designed a facemask that helped successfully contain the 1910 Manchurian plague and who was the first Chinese person ever nominated for a Nobel Prize in Medicine. It's a fascinating story about public health, systemic racism, legacy, and important passion projects.

Medical School and Residency Admissions: It's Not Personal

When I was in my second year of medical school, a third-year student (who later also went into emergency medicine, as I did) came to speak to our class about being on the wards. He gave an animated talk about how important it was to recognize that when residents, attendings, or nurses hollered at us on our clinical rotations, 99% of the time, it wasn't personal. He likened the situation to Boston traffic - how drivers lean on their horns simply because they are frustrated about their days.

It's not personal, he said.

I say the same to those I mentor. Applicants get an interview at one highly ranked institution but rejected at what is considered a lesser one with no clear cause. Faculty interviewers mix candidates up with one another; some turn up wholly unprepared - reading applicants' AMCASes or ERASes for the first time during the interview itself. 

Remember: It's not personal. This process is arduous and cruel, and most candidates, faculty, and program coordinators are tired and doing their best in a dysfunctional system.

Going to Medical School at Age 30+

According to the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC), approximately 3.5% of this year's matriculants to medical school are entering at 30+ years old. I was in my early twenties when I started, and there was a definitive difference in maturity and composure between the "older" students in the class and the rest of us.

Traditionally, some medical schools have been reluctant to train older students, as they see their career longevity truncated compared to younger pupils', however, with increasing demand for physicians and burnout that may shorten younger doctors' careers anyway, some schools are now more open-minded.

Here is a piece from the AAMC about folks who start medical school later.

Three-Year Medical School?

Ezekiel Emmanuel recently wrote a piece in the New York Times with two collaborators arguing the benefits of changing medical school to three years from four. The primary point was financial: Starting next year, under the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act," federal student loans for those in professional graduate programs will be capped at $50,000 per year. Grad PLUS loans will be eliminated completely, leaving half of medical students in the lurch.

Dr. Emmanuel and his collaborators point out that most medical students now arrive with upper-level academic background in sciences and that fourth-year medical school is almost like a "gap year." While I hesitate to agree with those two points, I do think he and his colleagues make other reasonable assertions: For example, making medical school harder to pay for will lead to fewer students from rural backgrounds and therefore fewer future physicians who will work in those needy areas.

Take a look at the piece here.

Reciprocal Liking

When I was at Harvard, we interviewed a residency applicant about whom I was enthusiastic, but when we sat down to talk about the candidate’s credentials, one of my colleagues put the kibosh on the applicant’s prospects. As it turned out, the candidate had made it clear (at least in my colleague's eyes) that he did not want to leave California. “If he’s not interested in us, why should we be interested in him?” my colleague asked.

Although you hope institutions will like you, keep in mind that institutions want to see that you are serious about them as well. 

There is a psychological principle called Reciprocal Liking: People tend to have positive feelings for those whom they perceive have positive feelings for them. Apply Reciprocal Liking to institutions when you interview. Be so familiar with the school/program that you implicitly convey you are excited and sincere about spending the next several years there. Know details about the institutional priorities, extra clinical opportunities, location, and associated hospitals. Make sure to have specific questions for your interviewer, ones that demonstrate your intimate knowledge of the institution and your belief that you could be a contributor and leader.