How to answer
How do you handle stress?
Medicine is demanding, and schools have seen students struggle. This question asks whether you know yourself well enough to look after yourself.
What it is really asking
Whether you have noticed what stress does to you, what you do about it, and whether you would ask for help. Burnout is common in doctors, and the panel wants students who see it coming.
Saying you never get stressed is the one wrong answer. It is either untrue or a sign you have not been tested yet.
Also asked as: “How do you look after yourself?” “What do you do when you are overwhelmed?” “How would you cope with the pressure of medicine?”
What interviewers hear too often
- I work well under pressure. Not an answer to the question. The panel asked how you handle it.
- A list of hobbies. Sport, music and friends, with no sense of when you use them or whether they work.
- Never asking for help. Handling everything alone, said as a virtue.
What a good answer does
- Specific signs. How you know you are getting stressed: sleep, temper, avoiding things.
- What you do. The habits that work for you, and an honest word about one that does not.
- Who you would turn to. Naming people and services shows you would use them.
Two openings
Both invented, and neither is yours to borrow.
The first is a claim with a hobby attached. The second shows self-knowledge, which is what the question is testing.
The follow-ups to expect
- Tell me about the most stressed you have ever been.
- What would you do if a friend in your year was not coping?
- What support would you look for in your first year?
- Do you think doctors are good at asking for help?
Test your own draft
- The honesty test. Is there one thing in your answer that does not make you look good? There should be.
- The help test. Does your answer include another person?
What it is marked on
Related questions
Other guides
- Start here What the interview is testing, and how the cycle runs.
- Timeline planner Put in your interview date and get a week by week plan.
- Pathway planner The whole road from school to consultant, drawn around your choices.
- Practice stations Real MMI stations with a two minute reading phase and a station clock.
- By university The interview at every undergraduate-entry school: format, timing, and what is marked.
- What is marked The six things every station marks, and how to practise each one.
- How to answer The questions every panel asks, what each is testing, and the follow-ups to expect.
- Question themes The subjects questions come from, from rural health to the profession, with prompts.
- Interview dates When each school sends invitations, holds interviews and makes offers this cycle.
- When you hear back Every school’s offer dates, and why the wait after the interview is so long.
- Formats What an MMI and a panel interview each are, and how to prepare for each.
- Interview soon? Days to go? What you can still book at short notice, and the prices.
- For parents Who your child is working with, and what I will not promise.
If you want a session
In a session I teach the structure, then ask the follow-ups until your answer holds. Thirty minutes, $40, online, credited to any package.