I guess that in most people’s lives there aren’t many opportunities to do something important. Some of us have serious platforms from which to effect change, others have jobs that involve saving lives, but for most of us the things we do aren’t that vital. That’s certainly the case with me. Wittering on about books is great fun, but mostly not life-changing. This week was different. This week I got to do something that I hope will make a real difference to people’s lives in years to come.

Some of you may remember that back in January I had a little rant about how things won’t get better from women, and trans women in particular, without education. I particularly noted that when training on trans issues was done, trans people were often excluded from the process. I honestly didn’t expect things to get any better in the near future.

But in February I did the trans history talk at the M-Shed. In the audience was Dr. Rachel Hogg, who works with Bristol University Medical School. She and some colleagues were in the process of putting together some LGBT+ training materials for the medical students. They’d done this in previous years for LGB issues, but this year they were keen to include trans and they wanted to know if I would be willing to help.

This was all part of something called Disability, Disadvantage & Diversity Week (3D Week for short). During this week, second year medical students get a range of lectures from people who are liable to be excluded from the health service in some way. There were sessions on disabilities, on cultural diversity, on homelessness, on world health and so on. Rachel is a former co-chair of the Gay & Lesbian Association of Doctors & Dentists, so she is well placed to talk about LGB issues. She wanted me to talk about trans issues.

Time Out. Let’s think about that for a minute. I was being asked to give two days of lectures to a group of young people who, in a few years time, will become doctors. Many of them will become GPs. These days the chances are that some of them will have trans friends. But for some I might be the first trans person they would knowingly meet. Can you say, “responsibility”?

In the past most GPs have had no training at all on gender medicine. If they touched on issues of sexuality it may well have been only with regard to mental health or HIV. Rachel said yesterday that when she was a student being gay was still being taught as a mental illness, even though it was officially declassified in 1973. UCL’s medical school now has some good resources on LGB issues (we showed some of their videos), but as far as we know no other medical school in the country has training on trans issues. If they do, I very much doubt that they have actual trans people involved. If that’s true, well done Bristol for leading the way.

Part of the point of 3D Week, however, is to get people from the community to talk to the students about the issues that affect them. I think that’s a wonderful idea.

Hopefully I did a decent job. I’m confident that I know what I’m talking about, and while I clearly can’t represent all trans people I did refer the students to the fabulous My Genderation films, and to GIRES where there is a lot of good scientific information.

I was a little worried going in as to what sort of a reaction I would get. I wasn’t just lecturing either. There were tutorial sessions in which it was going to be necessary for me to be very open and accept the sort of intrusive questioning that I’d normally tell people is very rude. As it turns out, the students were wonderful. They were really nice young people, culturally quite diverse, and all wanting to learn about helping LGBT+ patients. Some of the comments that Rachel and I had after the sessions were very heartwarming.

I’d like to thank Rachel for involving me in this, and also huge props to Anna Taylor, the medical student whose idea the whole 3D Week project is. Thanks also to Dr. Hannah Condry from the Medical School for making the whole thing happen, and to Lea and Chrissie in the admin team for their support. Most of all, however, I’d like to thank the students for attending, and for being so receptive to the ideas we were putting forward. Having GPs who are trained in trans issues will make a huge difference to the lives of trans people in the coming years. I can’t begin to express how happy and proud I am to have had a part in making that happen.