My interview at the school that is currently at the top of my list was, shall I say, interesting.
The highlight (if you're considering debacle-value) or lowlight (when considering my chances of admission) of the interview came when my interviewer asked what I would do if a kid was bleeding out and his parents were refusing a blood transfusion because they are Jehovah's Witnesses.
Usually I'm really good at these ethical situations but the kid thing threw me for a loop. Parents technically have the ultimate say for the treatment of young kids. But I know there have been court cases that have challenged that, with parents even being prosecuted for letting their kids die by withholding life-saving medical care.
The Jehovah's Witness thing also didn't help since religious beliefs are often protected and get you out of a lot of morally questionable things. But again, religion cannot be an excuse for essentially killing a child who legally can't make decisions for himself.
Based on the title of this post, you can probably guess what I ended up saying. My ultimate answer (once the interviewer pressed me into giving him one, since I avoided answering the question directly by talking around the answer but not making any sort of decision) was that I would honor the parents' wishes.
As soon as that came out of my mouth, I knew it was the wrong thing to say, but it was too late to take it back. The interviewer replied, "So you'd let the kid die." In an attempt to somewhat fix the situation I responded with, "Well, I wouldn't just let him die. I'd do everything in my power to save his life." It clearly wasn't enough as I saw the interviewer scribble "die" in his notes. Not good.
I looked it up afterwards hoping that there was something out there supporting my erroneous position on the matter. Instead, I found that I was wrong in my decision. Dead wrong (pardon the pun).
Apparently, doctors are "obligated to follow federal and state regulations for the care of minors. While regulations vary from state to state, and from institution to institution, children under the age of 18 generally cannot be denied a blood transfusion when it is considered a life saving therapy."
There you have it. I just killed a kid, and I want to be a doctor.
Like I've said before, I do fantastically well during 90% of my interviews. It's those 10% of answers like this one that get me placed on the waitlist, or in this case, most likely rejected.
That's too bad because I really liked this school.
I'm so sorry that happened to you! I know all ethical questions are fair game, but that question sounds like a bit too much and it seems like the interviewer didn't really care about the rest of your answer, even though you clearly meant well. I hope this doesn't hurt you too much in their acceptance decision. And don't let it get you down for the rest of your interviews! :)
ReplyDeleteThank you for the kind words. What I wrote in the post was the second part of an ethical scenario. At first the interviewer asked what I would do if a mom came in with a kid with a very high fever and refused a certain kind of treatment. I said I'd talk to her about the risks of not treating the kid and what would happen if he did or didn't receive treatment. If she still refused then I'd contact social services.
DeleteApparently the interviewer didn't get the response he wanted with that answer so he escalated it to the emergency Jehovah's Witness scenario I described above.
Hopefully my answer to the first part of the scenario somewhat offsets the damage I did with killing a kid and doesn't take me out of the running completely.
Honestly, though, I'll be very surprised if I get accepted after this debacle.