After completing medical assistant school, a graduate should attain the proper licensure and begin applying to and interviewing for jobs. By understanding the questions to expect, candidates can better prepare to wow their potential employers. Here, Prism Career Institute goes over seven common medical assistant job interview questions to help put you at ease.
Why Are You Interested in This Position?
This is a common icebreaker ahead of more field-based medical assistant job interview questions. It helps interviewers to learn more about a candidate than what appears on their resume. Answering this question can involve explaining why someone wants to work in healthcare, such as a desire to help people, or discussing their experience in medical assistant school. A candidate can also talk about personality traits or values that emerged during their childhood or young adult life, which are relevant to a medical assistant’s work.
What Are Your Strengths and Weaknesses?
An interviewer wants to gauge a candidate’s confidence in their abilities and the strongest skills they would bring to the position. Being a people person, using effective communication practices, or being a team player fits well within typical medical assistant responsibilities. While talking up strengths is important, so is acknowledging weaknesses. Interviewers ask candidates about their shortcomings to determine their self-awareness and willingness to improve. They want to see if a candidate is capable of self-reflection and is actively seeking professional growth. A candidate should discuss weaknesses honestly, so interviewers have a complete sense of their mindset and career goals.
What Clinical and Administrative Tasks Do You Have Experience In?
A medical assistant is expected to serve in an array of clinical and administrative duties. A candidate’s response to this question gives a sense of their work ethic to complete assignments well and on time. Interviewers want to know how often a candidate has performed tasks such as taking a patient’s temperature and other vitals or sterilizing medical equipment. For administrative duties, they’ll want to get a sense of a candidate’s communication skills when dealing with people face-to-face or over the phone. They’ll also want a candidate to elaborate on any experience filling out forms, reviewing medical records, or performing billing and bookkeeping services.
How Do You Protect the Rights and Privacy of Patients?
An interviewer will want to evaluate a candidate’s knowledge of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). The law strengthens a patient’s right to control any release or correction of their personal health information. Interviewers ask this question to make sure a candidate understands the law and that they’ll be committed to following it as they work. They’ll want to get a sense of a candidate’s practices when it comes to managing patient information and the measures they take to guard it. A candidate should discuss any training sessions or programs they completed related to HIPAA compliance, as well as any other patient information privacy regulations.
How Would You Manage a Difficult Patient Situation?
Every candidate has had unique professional experiences, and we all face challenging situations throughout life. Difficulties can arise in healthcare settings, particularly through a medical assistant’s work with patients. On a given day, a patient could be in a poor mood and hard to work with. A physician may also give them an upsetting diagnosis during an appointment, or they can be dealing with a severe long-term health condition. Interviewers need to get a sense of a candidate’s empathy and ability to always be compassionate. They’ll always want to see how a candidate performs under stress and if their approach could calm or worsen a situation.
Why Should We Hire You?
It’s not unusual for this question to conclude an interview. A candidate should use this opportunity to tie their personal background, work ethic, career goals, and personality to explain why they’re uniquely qualified for a role. Since they won’t know exactly how others will answer this question, candidates should be themselves as they explain how they would effectively satisfy medical assistant requirements. Using clear and concise statements about how well they fit the job can instill a positive impression within an interviewer.
Enroll in Our Medical Assistant School to Prepare for a Healthcare Career
Having the proper education, experience, and preparation allows candidates to answer medical assistant job interview questions effectively. The Medical Assistant program at Prism Career Institute provides students with a quality education through our instructors and first-hand experiences. Additionally, we offer career services to assist with job searching and interview preparation.
For more information, reach out to our Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, or Cherry Hill and West Atlantic City, New Jersey locations for day and evening class schedules. Apply online or contact us to learn more.