Character

At this point, you may think we should follow the Nobel winner of economics and design for the admission interview a structured script that focuses on standardized factual questions for the assessment of personality trait.

But that wouldn’t work. On one hand, senior professors would never agree to conduct admission interview purely for fact collection – and leave the judgement to the central administration. More importantly, we actually do not know for sure what personality traits make a good doctor.

You may be surprised and say, “Aren’t we aiming for applicants who are enthusiastic and eager to help the sick people?”

Yes and no. These are desirable characters but they are in abundant supply. What we really need are youngsters who are willing to take up an extra call when there is an urgent need, those who are willing to be the fifth assistant of a prolonged ultra-major surgical operation from which he could learn nothing, those who could continue to do the ward round when he has a post-nasal drip or ulcer pain, those who are wiling to complete the diagnosis coding or medical report despite they have never seen the patient, as well as those who could stand the temptation and remain enthusiastic ten or twenty years later.

As the Finagel’s Law states:
The data we have are not the data we want.
The data we want are not the data we need.
The data we need are not available.