Sexual misconduct in surgery

Support

If you experience or witness sexual harassment or assault in the workplace, if you feel able, please report it through your employer's procedures and, if appropriate, to the police. There is third-party help and support available via the links below. 

If you need advice on the legal process or emotional support from a trained counsellor, RCS England provides a 24/7 Confidential Support and Advice Service – the helpline can be reached on 0800 028 0199.

• NHS – Help after rape and sexual assault

• GOV.UK – Victim and witness services

• WPSMS – Help and support

Our actions tackling sexual misconduct

Working closely with the WPSMS, we have appointed our Vice-President, Professor Vivien Lees and, at a staff level, Lucy Davies, Executive Director, to oversee the implementation of our work to end sexual misconduct. We have also appointed Professor Rosalind Searle, an independent expert advisor, to provide external challenge. The actions we have taken to date are set out below. 

Implementation and investigation

• We have publicly challenged the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service (MPTS) on the adequacy of their processes. Our surgical community is concerned about whether sufficient penalties are consistently being applied to perpetrators of sexual misconduct, especially where the GMC has pushed for a stronger sanction. We will respond to their proposed new methodology for decisions and sanctions. 
  
• We continue to lobby the new government to inform their policies to tackle sexual misconduct. Baroness Merron, the minister for patient safety and women’s health, attended the most recent RCS-hosted WPSMS meeting on supporting and reporting processes.
• We continue to meet with the GMC and other national organisations to hold them to account and discuss how to implement the WPSMS' recommendations. 

The next phase of our work is to pursue genuine reform of reporting and investigation to support targets and witnesses to feel safe and confident to raise concerns. As part of this, in October 2024, we hosted the WPSMS meeting on 'supporting and reporting' to enhance systems for raising concerns. We are formulating an action plan based on the issues and recommendations identified by participants, to be published in early 2025.

Policies and code of conduct

• We have published a new Code of Conduct for our membership, volunteer base, and staff. A comprehensive policy to sit alongside this and a code of conduct for our events will follow shortly. 
• We are signatories to the NHS England Sexual Safety Charter and the BMA Sexism Pledge and wrote to NHS trusts that were not signatories to the charter to successfully encourage them to sign. NHS England has since made these commitments mandatory. 
• We have welcomed the GMC's updated Good Medical Practice, which now unambiguously states sexual misconduct is unacceptable and encourages active bystander behaviour.
• We are reviewing Good Surgical Practice, our own core surgical standards document, to ensure it also addresses the need to tackle sexual misconduct. We will publish this in 2025.
• All staff and Council members must undertake regular Equality and Diversity training. We are reviewing this to ensure it is still appropriate, clear and explicitly addresses sexual misconduct, and ensure it is rolled out to all College representatives. 

Education

We are committed to:

• Developing and signposting impactful, targeted resources and training on being an active bystander, with specific reference to incidents of sexual misconduct.
• Continuing to provide our unconscious bias e-learning and guidance, available free of charge to all on our online learning platform. 

Culture and performance

We have diversity, equity and inclusion firmly rooted in our strategy, values and operational delivery and we have made significant governance changes to ensure diversity in our leadership and in our activities. 

Read more about our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion work.

Research from the University of Exeter and University of Surrey, as part of their involvement with the Working Party on Sexual Misconduct in Surgery, revealed the extent of sexual misconduct by colleagues — including sexual harassment, sexual assault, and rape — within the UK surgical workforce. The in-depth study, published in the British Journal of Surgery in 2023, analysed anonymous online survey responses from 1,434 participants (51.5% women) from the surgical workforce.

• two-thirds of women (63.3%) had been the target of sexual harassment from colleagues, along with almost a quarter of men (23.7%)
• the majority of participants (89.5% of women, 81% of men) said they have witnessed some form of sexual misconduct by colleagues
• only 16% of those impacted by sexual misconduct made a formal report 

Figures from Breaking the Silence, the Working Party on Sexual Misconduct in Surgery report, September 2023

Read the research
Please note that this research contains information and experiences that are distressing and may be triggering to some. Please get in touch with the RCS England Confidential Support and Advice Line on 0800 028 0199 to talk to a trained counsellor.

NHS staff survey

The NHS Staff Survey results, published in March 2024, reported that almost 9% of all NHS staff and 18% of medical and dental staff in training have been the target of unwanted sexual behaviour in the NHS from patients, service users, their relatives or other members of the public. Read our response.

GMC national training survey

The GMC national training survey, published in July 2024, reported that 16% of females in surgical training reported experiencing unwelcome sexual comments or advances. Read more.

Discussion

In addition to the actions we are taking, discussion and awareness-raising play an important role in eradicating sexual misconduct.

Read

• Sexual assault in surgery: a painful truth, RCS England Bulletin, 2021
• Sexual assault in surgery: a personal perspective- A letter to the authors, RCS England Bulletin, 2021
• RCS England response to NHS Staff Survey results, 2024
• RCS England response to findings of GMC national training survey, 2024
• Breaking the silence on sexual misconduct in surgery: one year on, RCS England Bulletin, 2024

Watch

• Sexual misconduct in surgery: Breaking the silence webinar with Tamzin Cuming, Women in Surgery Chair, 2023

Listen

• Our archive of podcasts covers a range of topic relating to diversity in surgery and making our profession a more inclusive one.