Interviewing future medical students gave me that rare thing: hope for the NHS |
When I mentioned to colleagues in the NHS that I was helping with admissions interviews for medical students, several responded with the same wry smile and weary shrug: “Do they know what they’re getting into?” Anyone working with the health service over the past few decades has seen the job conditions get tougher, salaries stagnate and idealism erode within a crumbling system. Brexit, Covid, austerity and the rise in the cost of living haven’t helped.
From the students’ perspectives, they’ve gone through a lot to get here too. Not just the usual high-level academic performance and résumé-building either. This is a group who dealt with school closures and lockdowns during impressionable years, many come from crowded schools with little support and coaching, and yet they’ve found a way to persevere.
Having spent years teaching in medical schools and talking to students, my main feeling is hope. They’re smart, respectful and polite, with interesting backgrounds and ideas. Rather than being put off by the pandemic, some have been drawn to medicine because of the key role of the NHS during those difficult years, and remember joining the Thursday “clap for carers” and putting rainbow signs in their windows at home. Quite a few are keen to get into public health research and want to combine clinical and academic careers.
These are young people who could walk into finance, tech, consulting, influencing … careers where their intelligence........