HEE and Oriel have sent out emails today informing candidates that in-line with government recommendations the face-to-face elements of the ST3 orthopaedic interviews have been cancelled for 1-3 April 2020.
For 2020 the decision has been made to move to selection based on self-assessment and short-listing scores rather than any kind of face-to-face interview (including skype/virtual) with trust put into trainees' self-assessment scoring.
While this will be undoubtedly frustrating for everyone that has been working hard and preparing for the interviews remember that everyone is in the same boat. Ortho Interview was founded in the chaos of moving from regional to national selection when little information was provided regarding interview scoring, format or even location until weeks before.
Do not get disheartened or distracted. We will keep you updated on the evolving changes as they are announced.
Further details regarding the HEE response can be found here.
"For all specialties recruiting at ST3/ST4 level to limit time requirements on clinicians, we are using self-assessment and shortlisting scores as the sole means of ranking applicants. There will be no validation of self-assessment scores where this already forms part of the initial application, however for general and vascular surgery where scores have not already been collected, a proportion of these will be validated with a small amount of clinical input. This is a high-trust model which limits use of clinician time in these unprecedented circumstances."
