Evaluation of the effect of socio-economic status on performance in a Multiple Mini Interview for admission to medical school

Abstract

Introduction: Widening participation in Medicine is a key policy priority as it helps promote a diverse and representative workforce and improves patient care. The selection process employed can influence the socio-economic composition of the student cohort and this study therefore evaluated whether Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) performance was influenced by school type or area-level Higher Education (HE) participation rates.

Methods: MMI performance for all UK applicants was recorded and consent to link performance with socio-economic data was requested using an applicant questionnaire. Station-level and total MMI scores, and offer rates were compared between applicants from non-selective, non-fee-paying schools and from selective and/or fee-paying schools; and between applicants from each quintile of area-level HE participation.

Results: 793 applicants were included in the analysis. MMI performance and offer rates were slightly higher for applicants from non-selective, non-fee-paying schools and/or from lower HE participation quintiles, but the effects were small and not statistically significant.

Conclusions: The MMI did not favour applicants from selective and/or fee-paying schools, or from areas with high HE participation rates. Work to evaluate whether the relationship between MMI and medical school performance is the same for all sub-groups of students is now required.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the 2012/13 applicants who consented to participate in this study. The MMI data were provided by Darren Round.

Declaration of interest: AS led the admissions process. CT helped to design one of the MMI stations and participated in the MMI as an interviewer.  Ethical approval: The MMI evaluation study was approved by the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Ethical Review Committee at The University of Birmingham (approval reference: ERN_12-0983).