RCGP Heritage

Leadership 

Image credit:  Lotte Therese Newman, Christian Furr, 1997, RCGP collection/Tamás Kolóti Photography 

Another person:  Iona Heath. I did know Iona Heath, because she was a partner in the Kentish Town Health Centre with the Caversham Group Practice, so I knew of her.  She was a bit younger than me, and very popular doctor, and everything.  I remember when she took the membership exam, she was eight months pregnant, and came top in the country.  That was somewhere in the sixties or seventies.  Yes, so there you are, so there!  Anyway, obviously a very impressive person, woman and doctor and everything, and when I was helping to organise but actually, kind of leading on it, the ’99 conference, I went to Aberdeen I think it was – the year before, just to see what it was like having these big conferences – and she was there, and I went up to Iona.  I said, ‘You’re going to come and do, I think it’s the Pickles lecture, the major lecture once a year, at our conference next year,’ and she said, ‘Oh, come on, you must be joking.’ Anyway, she did, I’m glad to say – I went back to my board and they said, ‘Yeah, we’ve got to have Iona Heath.’  She was the first woman to do it – in ’99, as late as that.  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. 

Leadership Image credit:  Lotte Therese Newman, Christian Furr, 1997, RCGP collection/Tamás Kolóti Photography 

And I remember my first meeting of CRAGPIE, Committee of Regional Advisors in General Practice, the first thing that was relatively amusing is, it was a male secretariat, and there was no concept that we might need a ladies toilet [laughter], which is actually quite interesting, how now in medical education, the balance is probably leaning much more towards women.  Anyway, it was almost like ‘in my grandmother’s basket’– do you know that game, when you have to remember?  As they went round the room, and somebody saying what are you doing about whatever it was, trainer development, and it would start off with regional advisor number one, and it went round the room and when you got to regional advisor number fifteen, you actually had ‘This is what we all need to do,’ because everybody had added, ‘This is what I’m doing’ and the next one was ‘Yes, I’m doing all that, and I’m doing’, so what we did is, we were driving standards all the time, it wasn’t a political agenda, it was an educational agenda. 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. 

Women GPs at work Image credit: Women in Medicine artwork, Kate Charlesworth 

And we then, I got shortlisted, we went to, they all wanted to meet ‘the wife’ [laughs] so my wife was pretty assertive, I can tell you, and they said, ‘Mrs MacGibbon, I’m sure you’ll be very happy to man the ’phone at the weekends,’ and she said, ‘No, I’ve actually got my own career, thank you very much, no.’ ‘Oh!’ – I bet, I probably didn’t get the job for that, which is great. I didn’t want it in the end. And when she said to them, ‘Well, why aren’t you interviewing women, anyway?’, both male shortlisted, they said, ‘Oh well, you can’t have women in a practice, ’cause they’re always going off and getting pregnant. Ha, ha.’  I mean it was shocking, that was the kind of attitude – we’re talking about forty years ago, hopefully it’s not quite like that now, but it has changed enormously, this gender balance between men and women doctors.  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. 

Women GPs at work Image credit: Women in Medicine artwork, Kate Charlesworth 

My colleagues were very generous. I have to say that. Though it is interesting ’cause I worked very hard when I was there. So, once, while I was still doing a lot, the international stuff, the College stuff, and I was a sixty-five per cent partner I think, and there were a hundred percent partners. They counted up, we did an audit of how many actual consultations and I'd done more than anybody. So, you know, although they were generous at giving me time off, they got a lot out of me when I was there. But, yes, because I was also, you know, doing the training is also another commitment. But it just about worked and you can't do everything. 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. 

Women GPs at work 

Image credit: Women in Medicine artwork, Kate Charlesworth 

I went to a meeting, Committee of Medical, Postgraduate Medical Education, something like that, Denis will probably remember, and it used to meet on the Euston Road.  Anyway, long story short, I followed a Postgraduate Dean in, who didn’t want to let me in, ’cause he told me this was for doctors.  [Laughter] Anyway, having got my way in and established that I was indeed a doctor, I was representing the College, I was talking about the quality of experience for SHOs, and this same guy, I won’t tell you where he came from, he said, ‘Didn’t I know that the only training grade in hospital was Specialist Registrar? And SHOs weren’t here to learn, they were here to work’.  That was a Postgraduate Dean, and that must have been late ’80s, I think. 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. 

Careers advice 

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

I think it was just that, you know, you were good at sciences, it was the sort of usual – want to help people, it was interesting, and I think the trouble in a way with medicine when you think about it, if you start thinking about it and you make that decision, it's quite hard to get off. I mean I don't regret, not, you know, doing it but you're almost on a sort of little conveyor belt. It's very hard to sort of stop thinking about doing medicine once you do because you know, you are very much encouraged to do it by everybody around, I think. So, and, but yeah, I, I think it just sounded like a nice idea. I also thought five years at university might, as being a student was nice. I didn't realise you didn't get five years of long holidays [laughter]. It’s by the by, that, so, so that was a bit of a shock. No, so, I don't think there was anything more than that. 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. 

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

I didn’t feel there was any pressure and I think, of course, the other problem at that stage was that for women to go into medicine was quite a struggle and if you looked at St Thomas' senior staff at that stage there may have been two women, I mean, so incredibly rare. So my guess is that although I think my father thought I was bright enough and, yeah, it would be good, but did women do medicine? I mean he didn't say that, and he always wanted us to have a good ed- so, I think there was, there was a certain ambivalence about it, but I certainly felt I wasn't pressed into going into medicine in any way.  So it was really only when I began my clinical course at Thomas' that it really hit me, that this was seen as a male enterprise and that women, not only women and general practice were really second-rate things. 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. 

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. 

Acceptable roles?Image credit: Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, 1889 

"Of course, general practice was always the thing I was after, and asked around, applied for various GP jobs, and including, um, one, which was actually, included friends of my parents who were both in practice, asked them if you’d like me to joining, absolutely nobody would accept a woman.  It was sort of fifty-, ’58, ’59, ’60, so in ’60, I can’t remember quite how, I joined a practice in Kensington, and was there from 1960 to ’66, with Mary Hellier who was very well known because she’d been practising all through the war, on her own, and Elizabeth Burt was the other one, and I joined them, and was there until ’66, when I got married" 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.