Whilst we're on the controversial topic of privilege in medicine, I'd like to share my thoughts (through a slightly jumbly, but important thread) with the Twitterverse.

Last week, I had a message on LinkedIn from a Year 11 student at Eton College. He wanted to ask me some questions about my medical school as he was interested in applying. I happily obliged, and he was super lovely and grateful.

My gut reaction was 'what on earth is a Year 11 student doing on LinkedIn? Shouldn't he be out playing (socially distanced) football with his mates and enjoying summer?'

I then had a little nosy and found he was an Eton student, and had already padded out his profile with some amazing experiences that will no doubt help him get into medicine.

This really got me thinking - I didn't even know what LinkedIn was in Year 11! I was just happy enough to have finished with GCSEs that were the first stepping stone to hopefully doing medicine.

Chances are that he was advised to get LinkedIn by his teachers/professional parents/medical contacts in order to network and find out more about medicine.

I may be wrong and he was just super conscientious, but his apparently privileged background would suggest that he's had support with this and will continue to, all the way through until he leaves Eton. How many working class/state school students get this kind of support?

Widening participation projects do absolutely amazing work aiming to level the playing field and this thread isn't to disregard this work at all.

It's rather to raise awareness of the inherent privilege that a lot of medics and future medics are born into, and then refuse to acknowledge it when they 'make it' in life (not saying this student will - I've seen it from people in his position, though).

Privilege is not inherently bad - it is defined as a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group. This can present in obvious ways like being able to attend private a school, or afford courses that strengthen your application.

Privilege exists at all levels, though. Privilege is part-time work being a choice, not a necessity where you otherwise risk having your electricity cut off. Privilege is having a well paid part-time job that you enjoy. These are some examples of my privilege.

There are many ways that I could be perceived as not privileged. I went to a state school. I'm proud of this; at least I could go to school. I'm part of the 4% of working class medics. At least I had food and a roof over my head. I could go on, but this isn't a pity thread.

What I'm trying to say is that while you may definitely have it worse than the collective 'them' (not going to a private school etc), someone will ALWAYS have it worse than you. I cannot fathom that medics of all people do not understand this.

I've gone on a slight tangent from my first tweet but I'd like to end with this. An understanding of privilege and health and social inequity is absolutely critical when working in healthcare.

You WILL harm patients, whether it be directly or indirectly, if you don't understand the fundamental biopsychosocial confounders of health.

I welcome discourse as I'm aware not everyone will agree with what I've said, but I will NOT take plain nastiness or personal attacks. I've seen far too much of that on here recently from both future and current doctors, which is quite frankly not on.

Also, apologies to whoever saw/interacted with this the first time I attempted to post it. I'm not the most expert Twitterer and totally messed up the formatting of the thread, so I deleted it and started again