The first female president of the Royal College of Surgeons Ms Clare Marx gave the Department of Surgery and Cancer's first Athena SWAN Lecture.

The Department of Surgery and Cancer hosted their first Athena SWAN Lecture on the 2nd December 2015 with guest speaker Ms Clare Marx, first female President of the Royal College of Surgeons.

Ms Marx gave an inspirational lecture entitled All changed, changed utterly, providing a fascinating insight into the history of women in surgery and her career journey as a surgeon, as the first female trauma and orthopaedic surgeon trainee in London in 1981, then the first female surgeon in East Anglia in 1993. She also spoke of the work the Royal College of Surgeons is doing with addressing the lack of female surgeons nationally, including the development of a new curriculum which will impact on both undergraduate and postgraduate training.

The lecture attracted a diverse audience, including junior doctors, 6th form students as well as Imperial staff and members of the public, which resulted in a lively debate following on from topics raised in the lecture and provided a fantastic platform for the junior medics and students to ask questions relevant to their concerns.

Ms Marx highlighted the need for leadership from the top and the need for mentoring and support if we are to enhance gender equality of women in surgery and across the board. This reinforced the importance of all the work the Department is doing with Athena SWAN initiatives to support our staff.

The lecture has now enabled the Department to forge links with the Royal College of Surgeons, which will be hugely beneficial with developing our plans to encourage and support women to pursue surgery as a career.

Watch Ms Marx’s Lecture: All changed, changed utterly.