Interview Selection
Under the most recent published format, your final selection score is out of 234:
- 200 marks from interview
- 34 marks from validated self-assessment
A total of 146 out of 234 is required to be appointable.
The interview has consisted of a single online circuit with four ten-minute stations, with two interviewers scoring independently in each station.
Before each station you receive five minutes of reading time with a document shared on screen, during which you may make brief notes. Paper notes may also be used during the interview, although electronic devices cannot be used for this purpose.
The four stations are:
Commitment to specialty — your portfolio, your reasons for choosing orthopaedics, and the evidence supporting them.
Clinical — typically two shorter scenarios, often incorporating radiographs, covering trauma and elective orthopaedics.
Prioritisation — a set of competing demands where you need to explain the order in which you would address them and why.
Communication — a scenario involving a patient or colleague, assessing the information you gather as well as the information you give.
Each station is marked against five named domains rather than on general impression.
| Station | Assessed domains |
| Commitment to specialty | Career motivation, learning and development; leadership and team involvement; organisation and planning; communication — information giving; academic |
| Clinical | Technical knowledge; problem solving and decision making; situational awareness; communication — information gathering; communication — information giving |
| Prioritisation | Organisation and planning; communication — information gathering; communication — information giving; judgement under pressure; situational awareness |
| Communication | Technical knowledge; situational awareness; judgement under pressure; communication — information gathering; communication — information giving |
Under this format, each station carries 50 marks. The four interview stations therefore contribute 200 marks, and your validated self-assessment contributes a further 34, giving a final score out of 234.
NHS England may also set a minimum score in an individual domain. A candidate who falls below that threshold may be ranked zero regardless of their overall score.
Ties are broken on clinical first, followed by prioritisation, communication, commitment to specialty and finally self-assessment.
Look at what recurs across the four stations.
Situational awareness is assessed in three stations and carries 30 marks. So does communication through information gathering, and so does communication through information giving.
Each of those contributes more marks than technical knowledge, which appears in two stations and carries 20.
That matters when you practise. A candidate can have excellent orthopaedic knowledge but still leave a significant number of marks behind by failing to gather enough information, communicate their reasoning clearly or demonstrate awareness of what is happening around the immediate clinical problem.
One further detail from the most recent format is easy to overlook: in the commitment to specialty station, the panel does not have your portfolio in front of them.
Your achievements cannot score simply because they exist in your portfolio. You need to explain them.
In our experience of interview preparation and mock circuits, candidates often have one station or domain where a disproportionate number of marks are being lost. Identifying that early gives you something specific to work on rather than simply repeating more questions.
