Medicine @ St Catherine's, Oxford in 2016

Interview format

4x 20 min interviews, over 2 days

Interview content

Logical challenges, mental maths, biology, chemistry, ethics / political questions

Best preparation

Practice papers, 'GCSE Bitesize' website

Advice in hindsight

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Final thoughts

Be honest in your personal statement ande ready to take about anything in it!

Remember this advice isn't official. There is no guarantee it will reflect your experience because university applications can change between years. Check the official Cambridge and Oxford websites for more accurate information on this year's application format and the required tests.

Also, someone else's experience may not reflect your own. Most interviews are more like conversations than tests and like, any conversation, they are quite interactive.

Interview Format

Test taken: BMAT

Number of interviews: 4

Skype interview: No

Interviews spread over 2 days

Length of interviews: 20 minutes each

What happened in your interview? How did you feel?

I was given some logical challenges, some mental maths, and some basic biology and chemistry questions.

There were also some ethical and political questions, regarding the health service and medical practice.

Each interview had a topic as its theme. We also talked about some content from my personal statement and some general questions about my personality, views and interests.

Three interviews were comfortable - I was stressed but started to relax soon after I began. One interview was challenging throughout and stressful, not in a negative but rather an exhilarating way.

How did you prepare?

I used the practice papers and the 'GCSE Bitesize' website.

What advice do you have for future applicants?

Looking back, what advice would you give to your past self?

I did not really prepare because I didn't know what to expect. I prepared answers for basic questions like "Why do you want to study medicine?" which was not useful at all.

My main piece of advice would be to be honest in your personal statement and be prepared to elaborate on everything you talked about there.