Women in general practice | Careers advice: Gill Yudkin

May 19, 2021, 04:29 PM

Gill Yudkin remembers job-hunting advice from a misogynist tutor.

Careers advice 

Image credit: ‘Lady physicians’ Punch, 23 December 1865, Wellcome Collection 


House jobs, yeah. That was interesting as well, as the gender thing was concerned.  I didn’t, there was no help to find House Jobs, and you weren’t allocated them, or whatever.  You just had to go out there and I didn’t get one at UCH and so, for the first time, I decided to go and see my tutor, who had been notably absent in my three years.  I said to him that I was concerned I hadn’t got a UCH House job, what advice could he give me?  And his advice was that I should wear glasses or something like that, to make me look older, next time I went for an interview… I was a little girl you see, as far as he was concerned… There, there, dear – go and look in the journals and see what jobs are available.  
Please note that the views expressed in these recordings are those of the interviewees, within their historical context, and may not represent RCGP views or policy.