Read on Twitter
Hey, medical students - try just not worrying about a change to a system that no longer impacts me, and I benefited greatly from!
Isn’t medtwitter great.
Isn’t medtwitter great.
Before any accusations of populism rear their head, the discourse around this is nuanced, and has many valid arguments on both sides. I am of the view that this is a broadly positive step for medical schools and their students, however the way it has been handled is embarrassing.
What could have been a flag flown for equality, diversity and inclusion if managed properly and more tactfully, has instead destroyed the trust that many students have in the ‘establishment’ that determines a non-insignificant part of their immediate future.
There is, or course, the argument that intercalated degrees can be a bit pay-for-play, and that an undeniable draw to them is the extra FPAS points on offer to give a competitive advantage. Students know it, doctors know it, and the medical education establishment know it.
To pretend otherwise is ridiculous, but to change things in this way, this immediately shows that either the powers that be fail to recognise it (unlikely), ignore it, or even worse do it out of some sort of spite.
From the reactions of some of medtwitter accusing students of game playing and strategy formation - yes, they are! And you would too (in fact, it’s highly likely you did)! Those are the rules of the game, and now the goalposts have been changed.
‘But it doesn’t matter where you do foundation’ is similarly crap. Clinically, probably not, but for everything else outside the job, it can have huge impacts. If someone feels so desperate to do a masters so they maybe have a chance of living near their family...
then maybe the system is broken. Medical students are the future you: just as smart, just as skilled, and just as deserving of respect. A recent Twitter discourse about ‘the way things used to be done’ attracted a lot of horror stories and promises that our younger generation...
of doctors, of which I’m proud to be a part, don’t act that way now. Well, this is that, and then is now, and they are you. Stop patronising your colleagues.
And thats my completely unsolicited stream of though about that.
And thats my completely unsolicited stream of though about that.
