Situational Residency Mock Interview
Practice 30 Situational Residency interview questions covering clinical scenarios, patient prioritization, and decision-making under pressure.
Question 2 of 30
If you were in a busy day of clinic and a key piece of equipment failed, how would you handle the workload, patients and stress moving forward until a fix was found?
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Ryan Brunner has over ten years of experience recruiting, interviewing, and hiring candidates in the healthcare, public service, and private manufacturing/distribution industries.
Practicing physicians work with a wide variety of medical equipment and technology and this equipment, though very expensive and modern, can break down from time to time. Your interviewers are looking to ensure that the residents that match into their program can handle the stress of vital equipment failure in a healthy, professional, and safe manner for all involved.
Ryan Brunner has over ten years of experience recruiting, interviewing, and hiring candidates in the healthcare, public service, and private manufacturing/distribution industries.
There are some key things that you want to highlight as you answer this question to prove your ability to think on your feet, make quick decisions, and take care of what's needed in the heat of the moment. First, you want to talk about your ability to find an alternate solution and work as part of a team in doing so. Next, you want to talk about your ability to prioritize any high-needs patients that are directly impacted by this equipment failure. Last, you want to talk about your calm demeanor and ability to think critically when the chips are down and you are the resident in charge.
Ryan Brunner has over ten years of experience recruiting, interviewing, and hiring candidates in the healthcare, public service, and private manufacturing/distribution industries.
"Upon finding out that something like a scanner or the EMR went down, my first thought would be to gather the team for a quick huddle to come up with any needed workarounds for patients. If it was a piece of equipment, we could put our heads together to find an alternate piece of equipment or borrow one from another department in the meantime. If we found out that the equipment would be out of order and there were no alternatives for the day, we'd have to loop in administrative staff to likely reschedule any patients for that day that would need the use of the equipment. In the end, doing what is right for the patients would be my top priority as the resident physician on duty that day."
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