Question themes
Disability and access to healthcare.
About one in five Australians lives with disability, so every doctor treats people with disability every week. The questions test whether you see the person or the label.
Why schools ask
People with disability, and especially people with intellectual disability, have poorer health outcomes and more trouble getting care than other Australians. Some of the reasons are physical, like an inaccessible clinic. More are about attitudes and communication.
Schools ask because the habits that make care work for a person with disability, such as asking rather than assuming and adjusting how you explain things, are the same habits that make a good doctor for everyone.
Worth knowing before the interview
- Diagnostic overshadowing. When a new symptom is put down to a person’s disability instead of being investigated. Pain, distress or a change in behaviour can be the only sign of a treatable illness in someone who cannot easily describe it.
- Supported decision-making. The idea that people with disability make their own decisions, with support where they need it, rather than having decisions made for them. The starting point is that they can decide.
- The NDIS. The National Disability Insurance Scheme funds disability supports. It does not fund health care, which is still the job of Medicare and the hospitals, and people can fall through the gap between the two.
- A recent Royal Commission. The Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability delivered its final report in 2023, and health care was part of what it examined.
What a strong answer shows
- Talking to the patient. Directly, even when a carer, a parent or a support worker is in the room.
- Adjusting the method. Longer appointments, plain language, pictures, a quiet room. The standard of care stays the same and the way of getting there changes.
- Asking. The person usually knows best what helps them, and asking them is the quickest way to find out.
Where answers go wrong
- Pity. An answer that frames disability as tragedy. Interviewers, some of whom have disability themselves, notice the tone at once.
- Assuming incapacity. Deciding someone cannot understand before trying to explain.
- Ramps only. An answer about wheelchair access and nothing else. Most barriers are in how people are spoken to and listened to.
Three prompts to run on the clock
Thirty seconds to read each one, then two minutes to answer it out loud. Record it if you can, and listen back once.
- A patient with an intellectual disability comes to an appointment with a support worker, who answers every question you ask the patient. How do you handle it?
- What is diagnostic overshadowing, and why might it matter more for some patients than others?
- A hospital’s online booking form cannot be used with a screen reader. Whose problem is that, and what would you do about it as a junior doctor who notices?
What these stations usually mark
Other themes
- Ethics scenarios Most circuits have at least one.
- Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health Many schools ask about it, and some build their whole mission around it.
- Rural and remote health Australia does not have enough doctors outside its cities, and several schools exist partly to change that.
- Public health and the community Questions about what keeps a whole population well: smoking laws, vaccination, junk food, housing.
- The profession Questions about the job rather than the patient: the training, the hours, burnout, technology, how medicine is changing.
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
Thirty minutes, $40, online, and it comes off any package you go on to book. Tell me which schools you are applying to and which of these worries you.