Questions to Ask a Doctor in an Interview
Questions to ask a doctor in an interview, mostly for a student, a career changer or a writer who has a doctor's time and wants to know what the job is like. The standard openers come first: why medicine, a typical day, the best and hardest parts. After them come training and what it cost, the working week, patients and difficult cases, life outside the job, and advice for anyone thinking of following. The last group is for the other kind of interview, a panel or practice manager meeting a doctor who has applied for a post. Each question has a note on what to listen for, what to ask next or when to leave it alone. None of it is meant for a patient's own appointment.
The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Start here
Why did you become a doctor?
Why ask it
The first answer is usually the tidy one: a relative who was ill, a good science teacher, wanting to help. Ask what the reason is now, after years in the job, because why people start and why they stay are often two different stories.
What does a typical day look like for you?
Why ask it
If the reply is that every day is different, ask about yesterday, start to finish. One specific day gets you clinic blocks, rounds, on-call and the charting done after everyone else has gone home.
What do you like most about being a doctor?
Why ask it
Helping people is true and tells you nothing, so ask for the last time the job felt worth it. A diagnosis that finally made sense or a patient who came back to say thank you shows what keeps this particular doctor going.
What is the hardest part of the job?
Why ask it
Notice whether the hard part is the medicine or everything around it. A doctor who names paperwork, time pressure or short staffing before any illness is describing the job as it is lived, which matters if you are weighing the career yourself.
What drew you to your specialty, and which others did you rule out?
Why ask it
The ones they ruled out are the interesting part. Doctors usually remember the rotation that put them off surgery or psychiatry, and that comparison says more about the work than a list of what they enjoy.
What part of the job would surprise someone who only knows medicine from television?
Why ask it
Expect paperwork, or how little shouting there is. Then ask which medical drama comes closest and what it still gets wrong, which is an easy question to enjoy and tends to end in a story from their own ward.
What qualities does a good doctor need that have nothing to do with grades?
Why ask it
For a school report this is the answer you will end up quoting. Get past 'compassion' by asking which quality they had to learn on the job, and which one they notice new students arriving without.
Training
How many years of training did it take, and what did it cost?
Why ask it
Years and debt are the two facts a career talk tends to skip. Get both, since either one alone gives a misleading picture, and ask how it works where they trained, because length and cost differ a great deal between countries.
What did you study before medical school, and how much did it matter?
Why ask it
Routes into medicine differ by country: some students apply straight from school, others after a first degree. Ask how it worked where they trained, and whether the subject they picked was any use once they were on the wards.
What was medical school like, compared with what you expected?
Why ask it
Nearly everyone remembers one particular shock: the sheer volume to memorise, the first day on a ward, or no longer being the strongest student in the room. Whichever they pick is the thing to prepare yourself for.
Were you ever squeamish, and how did you get past it?
Why ask it
A common private worry for anyone considering medicine, and one doctors tend to answer with a story. Some will admit to going faint the first time they watched an operation. Ask whether it wore off, or whether they picked a specialty that avoids what bothered them.
What did residency teach you that medical school could not?
Why ask it
Residency is the North American word. Elsewhere it may be foundation years, specialty training or a registrar post, so use whichever term they do. The answer tends to be about responsibility, and often about the first night the decision was theirs to make.
During training, was there a point when you nearly walked away?
Why ask it
Give this one room. A doctor who names the year and the reason is trusting you with something, and what kept them in is usually more useful than what nearly pushed them out. If the answer is never, ask about classmates who did leave.
Who taught you the most, and what did they do that other teachers did not?
Why ask it
A good teacher gets remembered for a single habit, like always sitting down at the bedside or asking the junior's opinion before giving their own. You come away with a method in one sentence and usually a story to go with it.
What do you wish you had known before you applied?
Why ask it
The useful replies are practical ones: how long the training years feel, how little say you get over where you are sent, what happens to friendships outside medicine. A student should take this answer down word for word.
The work
What kinds of problems do you see most often?
Why ask it
The answer is rarely the dramatic one. A family doctor may say blood pressure, sore backs and low mood, and that ordinary list is closer to the job than any case that would make the news. Ask which of them they still find interesting.
How much of your week is time with patients, and how much is everything else?
Why ask it
Numbers make the complaint concrete. If they say two hours of notes every evening, you have learned something a student choosing a specialty can actually use.
How many patients do you see on a normal day, and how long do you get with each one?
Why ask it
Those two numbers explain most of what a patient feels in the waiting room. Then ask what they would do with five more minutes per visit, which tells you what currently gets squeezed out.
How many hours do you work in an ordinary week, and how often are you on call?
Why ask it
Ask for the count including work finished at home, and what on call means for them: in the building or reachable by phone. Hours differ widely by specialty and employer, so report it as one doctor's week and not the whole profession's.
Who do you work with most closely, and who has the final say?
Why ask it
Asking who decides gets you the working hierarchy: nurses, pharmacists, senior doctors and where the friction sits. A list of job titles would not show you that.
What does a good day at work look like?
Why ask it
Doctors are asked about bad days so often that this one gets a fresher answer. It is frequently defined by what did not happen: nobody kept waiting, notes finished before leaving, time to explain something properly.
Is the pay what people outside medicine assume it is?
Why ask it
Asking about the assumption is easier on both of you than asking for a figure. Pay depends on the country, the specialty and the employer, so ask how theirs is worked out and how long it took to get ahead of the cost of training.
How do you keep up with new research when there is so much of it?
Why ask it
Ask what they actually read or listen to, how many hours a month it takes and who they ring when a guideline changes. Many countries also require a set amount of continuing education, so ask how that works for them.
What has changed most in your field since you trained?
Why ask it
Someone twenty years in can describe the same condition treated three different ways. That history is not in any textbook a student would be handed.
Which new tool in your field actually changed your practice, and which one was oversold?
Why ask it
Naming the oversold one takes more candor than praising the useful one. If everything has been an improvement, you are getting the brochure version.
What do you expect your job to look like ten years from now?
Why ask it
A forecast is easier to give than an opinion, and most doctors have a firm one about what software, new drugs or staffing will do to their work. Ask which part of it they think will always need a person in the room.
If you could change one thing about how health care runs where you work, what would it be?
Why ask it
Holding it to one thing forces a choice between funding, staffing, the records system and how appointments get booked. In a profile or a report, their reason is worth more than the complaint.
Patients
How do you earn the trust of someone you met ten minutes ago?
Why ask it
The answers worth having are small and physical: sitting down, using the patient's name, asking what worries them most before touching the keyboard. Any student can start practising that years before medical school.
What do you do when a patient arrives angry or frightened?
Why ask it
You will probably hear that anger is usually fear or a long wait in disguise. Ask for the first sentence they say in that room, because the opening line is the whole technique.
How do you handle it when a patient has already looked everything up online?
Why ask it
A well-read patient is either a nuisance to them or a head start, and you will hear which. Follow up by asking what they would rather patients brought along, and keep the answer for your own next appointment.
What do you do when a patient refuses the treatment you recommend?
Why ask it
Ask for a case where the refusal turned out to be reasonable. A doctor who has one ready treats a patient's no as information, and the story usually shows how they explained the risk without leaning on the person.
Does what a patient can afford ever change the care you give them?
Why ask it
In some places the answer is about insurance and what a visit costs. In a publicly funded system it is more likely to be waiting lists and what the service does not cover. Either way, ask for one plan they changed because of cost or access.
How do you give a patient bad news?
Why ask it
Listen for a method: sitting down, saying it plainly, then waiting. If the answer stays at being compassionate, ask what they do in the first minute, because the mechanics are the part that can be taught.
What happens when you genuinely do not know what is wrong?
Why ask it
Many doctors will say it happens more often than patients imagine. The useful part is what comes next: telling the patient so, ordering one more test, ringing a colleague, or waiting and looking again in a week.
Is there an ethical decision you are willing to talk about?
Why ask it
Letting them choose the case avoids a rehearsed answer about principles. What matters is whether they can describe a decision they still feel unsettled about.
How do you deal with it when you make a mistake?
Why ask it
Of everything here this is the most likely to get a guarded reply, so leave it until they are talking freely. A doctor who is willing will describe telling the patient, the case review that follows and who looks after the clinician. How that works differs between hospitals and countries, so ask what happens where they are.
How did you learn to cope when a patient dies?
Why ask it
Only ask once the conversation is going well, and say plainly that they can skip it. What you tend to get is a routine more than a feeling: a minute alone, a word with the team, then the next patient. Never ask for details of a particular death.
Is there a patient you still think about?
Why ask it
This is where a profile gets its story. Remind them to change the details, do not ask for a name, a date or a ward, and let them choose whether it is a happy memory or a hard one.
Life and advice
What have the hours cost you outside work?
Why ask it
Ask about the effect rather than the schedule. Missed events, broken sleep and whether they would take the same rota again say more than a number of hours ever does.
What do you do with a hard day once you get home?
Why ask it
Asked in general, how a doctor handles stress gets 'exercise and family'. Asked about the evening after one bad shift, it gets the real routine: the drive home in silence, the run, the colleague they phone.
Have you ever felt burned out, and what did you change?
Why ask it
Doctors use the word about themselves, so you can say it plainly. The second half is the useful one: fewer shifts, a new employer, a different specialty, or nothing, because nothing could be changed.
What do you protect in your week, whatever the schedule does?
Why ask it
Work-life balance as an idea gets a sigh. One protected thing, such as a child's match, Sunday lunch or a morning swim, is concrete enough to answer and shows how much say they have over their own time.
What do you do that has nothing to do with medicine?
Why ask it
A relief after the heavier questions, and a good place to end a profile. See whether the hobby is an escape from the job or oddly close to it, like the surgeon who builds furniture.
If you had not gone into medicine, what would you be doing now?
Why ask it
The other career they name shows what they enjoy underneath the medicine, whether that is teaching, fixing things, working with their hands or solving puzzles. Some will tell you about a job they very nearly took.
What do you teach students and residents that is not in the curriculum?
Why ask it
What they add tends to be judgment: when to call for help, how to hand over, how to admit you are lost. That is the part worth writing down.
What should someone at my stage be doing now if they want to become a doctor?
Why ask it
Say where you are first, whether that is school, university or another career, so the advice fits. Be ready for something less glamorous than you hoped: grades in particular subjects, time spent around people who are ill, proof you can stick at dull work.
What would make you tell someone not to go into medicine?
Why ask it
Franker than asking who should become a doctor. The reasons they list, such as doing it for a parent, for the status or for the salary, make a checklist to hold your own motives against.
What other jobs in health care should I look at before I settle on this one?
Why ask it
Doctors work beside nurses, pharmacists, physiotherapists and paramedics every day, and have a view on which role suits which kind of person. A straight answer here can save years of training for the wrong job.
Would you choose medicine again, knowing what you know now?
Why ask it
The pause before the reply is part of it. A quick yes, a yes with conditions and 'yes, but a different specialty' are three separate answers, so note the exact words.
Would it be possible to watch you or a colleague at work for a day?
Why ask it
Save it for the end, once they have a sense of you. Rules on observers differ by hospital, clinic and country, and a no is usually about patient privacy or paperwork, not about you. If it is a no, ask who arranges student placements there.
Who else should I talk to after you?
Why ask it
One interview gives you one specialty and one temperament. An introduction to a doctor in another field, a nurse, or a trainee a few years in is often the most valuable thing you walk out with.
What should I have asked you that I did not?
Why ask it
A doctor who talks to students hears much the same questions each time. Leave the door open at the end and they often raise the subject they care about most, which is frequently the best quote of the interview.
Hiring
What made you apply here in particular?
Why ask it
From here on the questions are for a panel or practice manager interviewing a doctor for a post. This one separates a candidate who has looked at your patient list, your rota and your town from one sending the same letter everywhere. A good answer names something you could check, such as a clinic you run or a colleague they spoke to.
Talk us through a recent case you found difficult, with the details changed.
Why ask it
The medicine needs a clinician on the panel to judge it. Everyone else can judge the telling: whether the reasoning comes in order, whether the patient sounds like a person, and whether the candidate says where they were unsure.
Explain a condition you treat often, the way you would to a patient with no medical background.
Why ask it
This is a demonstration, so a non-clinician can score it. Count the terms that go unexplained, and notice whether they stop to check you have followed.
Tell us about a disagreement with a colleague over a patient's care. How did it end?
Why ask it
A story in which the candidate was simply right tells you little. Hope for one where a nurse or a junior raised the concern, and listen for whether it was heard or overruled, because your own staff will be in that position.
Tell us about a complaint a patient made about you, and what you did with it.
Why ask it
Complaints come with seeing a lot of patients, so 'never' deserves a gentle second try. What matters is whether they can give the patient's side fairly before their own, and whether anything changed afterwards.
The clinic is running an hour behind. What do you do?
Why ask it
There is no clean answer, which is why it is worth asking. Some shorten every visit, some go out and tell the waiting room, some stay late. Notice whether anyone else, the receptionist for instance, has a part in the plan.
What do you need from the staff and systems around you to do your work well?
Why ask it
Better asked now than discovered in the third month. If they are used to a scribe, a second exam room or set time for results and you cannot offer it, both sides should know before an offer is made.
Which part of the job are you least strong at, and how do you cover it?
Why ask it
This is the weakness question in a form a doctor can answer honestly. A named gap with an arrangement around it, such as a procedure they refer on or letters they finish late, is more use to you than a strength dressed up as a flaw.
How would the nurses and front-desk staff at your current job describe working with you?
Why ask it
Say beforehand that you take references and the answer becomes more careful. Nurses and reception are named on purpose: they see how a doctor behaves when the day is going badly.
What would you like to ask us?
Why ask it
Give it ten minutes, not the last two. A candidate who goes straight to call, staff turnover or who answers patient messages may have been burned by one of them before, and it is fair to ask which.
Interviewing a physician
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Before you sit down
Find out what they actually do
A hospitalist, a surgeon and a family physician have almost nothing in common day to day. Ten minutes of reading beforehand lets you ask about their work rather than about medicine in general.
Choose by what the interview is for
A school report needs the openers and the advice near the end. A career decision needs the training questions, the working week and what the job costs outside it. A profile lives on the patient questions, because that is where the stories are. A hiring panel wants the last group, and can borrow from the patient questions by asking for one real case each time.
Ask how long you have, and plan for half of it
Clinical schedules collapse. Pick your five most important questions and put them first, so a twenty minute conversation that becomes ten is still worth having.
Ask before recording
Ask at the start, before the first question. Doctors are careful about anything that could touch a patient's confidentiality, and a recorder that appears halfway through makes for a guarded conversation.
During the conversation
Keep the heavy questions for the second half
A question about a death, a bad outcome or burnout lands differently after twenty minutes of easy talk than it does in the first five. Say they are free to pass, and if they do, move on without comment.
Ask for one case, not a category
A request for a specific patient encounter, with details changed, gets a real answer. A question about how they handle difficult cases in general gets a policy statement.
Follow the number
When they say a shift is long or the notes take forever, ask how long and how many. Quantities are easy for clinicians to give and are the details a reader remembers.
Let silence sit
The questions about bad outcomes and uncertainty often produce a pause. Filling it with a softer question is how interviews stay shallow.
What to avoid
Do not bring your own symptoms
Turning the conversation into a free consultation ends it. If you have a medical question, say so plainly at the end and accept a redirection to your own doctor.
Do not push for identifiable detail
Asking which patient, when, or at which hospital puts them in a difficult position. Let them keep the story general enough to tell.
Do not treat the job as heroism
Praise tends to shut down candid answers about hours, pay and frustration. Ask about the work and let the difficulty show up on its own.
Do not improvise on a hiring panel
Put the same questions to every candidate and agree beforehand what a good answer sounds like. What an employer may ask about health, age, family or immigration status depends on employment law where you are, so check with whoever handles HR before the day. These questions do not test clinical knowledge either. That takes a clinician on the panel.