Achieving good medical practice: guidance for medical students

Domain 4: Trust and professionalism

Patients must be able to trust doctors with their lives and health, and doctors must be able to trust each other.

Good doctors uphold high personal and professional standards of conduct. They are honest and trustworthy, act with integrity, maintain professional boundaries and do not let their personal interests affect their professional judgements or actions.

Acting with honesty and integrity

Honesty

  1. Doctors hold a trusted position in society and must make sure their conduct - both professionally and personally - justifies their patients' trust in them and the public's trust in their profession.
  2. As a student aiming to join a trusted profession, you have to meet a higher standard of behaviour than other students, who are on courses that don't directly lead to joining a profession.

How can I demonstrate honesty?

You must behave honestly from the point that you apply to medical school, during your studies and when you start working as a doctor.

Here are some practical things you must do to demonstrate you are honest in your work as a medical student.

  • Don't pass off the work of others as your own, including work generated using artificial intelligence (AI). This is plagiarism.
  • Don't self-plagiarise by submitting your own previously assessed work.
  • Be honest about your experience and qualifications. This means you must not give your supervisors or teachers any misleading or false information about your qualifications or experience, or include such information in documents such as CVs and job applications.
  • When you carry out research, make sure you report findings accurately and truthfully.
  • Be honest and trustworthy in all your communications with patients and colleagues. This means you must make clear the extent of your knowledge and check that the information you provide is correct.
  • Be open and truthful about your health and make use of the processes put in place by your medical school to support you.
  • Be honest in the work you submit as part of your course. This means you must not claim to have done something, like a practical procedure on a clinical placement, if you have not.
  • Don't say you have attended teaching sessions or clinical placements if you haven't. And don't ask another student to sign in for you.
  • Be honest and open in financial and commercial dealings with employers, insurers, indemnifiers and other organisations and individuals.

Maintaining professional boundaries

  1. Doctors must not act in a sexual way towards patients or use their professional position to pursue a sexual or improper emotional relationship with a patient or someone close to them.
  2. As a medical student, your studies will bring you into contact with patients and members of the public, who can be physically and emotionally vulnerable. Because of this, and the fact that you'll be joining a trusted profession, you must not use your position to pursue a sexual or improper emotional relationship with them. This includes situations where a patient or someone close to them tries to initiate a relationship with you.
  3. Doctors must not express their personal beliefs (including political, religious and moral beliefs) to patients in ways that exploit their vulnerability or could reasonably cause them distress. This also applies to you as a medical student.

Communicating as a doctor

All professional communication

  1. Doctors must be honest and trustworthy, and maintain patient confidentiality in all their written, verbal and digital communications with patients and colleagues. They must make clear the extent of their knowledge and check that the information they provide is accurate, not false or misleading. This also applies to you as a medical student.

Public professional communication, including using social media, advertising, promotion, and endorsement

  1. When communicating publicly as a doctor – including using social media, advertising services, and promoting or endorsing any services or products, they must:
    • follow the guidance in the previous section
    • declare any conflicts of interest
    • not exploit people’s vulnerability or lack of medical knowledge
    • make sure what they communicate is in line with their duty to promote and protect the health of patients and the public.

This also applies to you as a medical student. See the more detailed guidance Using social media as a medical professional for further information.

Social media dos and don'ts

Do

  • check your privacy settings so you know who can see what on the platforms you use. But remember that social media sites cannot guarantee confidentiality whatever privacy settings you use
  • remember that the apps you use may link to your social media profile and that information from that site may be seen by users of the app
  • maintain boundaries by not engaging with patients or others about a patient's care through your personal social media profiles or platforms. Instead, if appropriate, use a separate professional platform or profile to respond
  • remember that once information is published on social media sites you may not be able to control how it is used by others and it can be difficult to remove it from the internet or the site it was originally posted on
  • use social media to express your views, but don't behave in a derogatory manner to other users and don't post discriminatory content
  • think carefully about how others, particularly patients both present and future, might perceive your content
  • be aware of how to manage and respond to online abuse. If you’re being bullied by a colleague online contact your medical school for advice on the next steps. You can also contact the GMC through our online form or by contacting us by phone or email.

Don't

Giving evidence and acting as a witness

  1. Doctors must be honest and trustworthy if asked to give evidence in any legal or disciplinary proceedings. They're also expected to report certain matters to the GMC, for example if they receive a caution from the police.
  2. As a medical student you are not registered with the GMC, but you have similar responsibilities in relation to your medical school. Medical schools must not graduate any student with a primary medical qualification who they don't consider fit to practise. This means, even if you meet all the competencies and pass your exams, your medical school can only graduate you if they are satisfied you are fit to practise. You'll also need to declare any fitness to practise issues when you apply for provisional registration with the GMC.

Private communication

  1. When communicating privately, including using instant messaging services, doctors should bear in mind that messages or other communications in private groups may become public. This also applies to medical students, and you should make sure that you only add content that you would be happy for a wider audience to see. You must also avoid sharing confidential patient information through these services.

Managing conflicts of interest

  1. Doctors:
    • must not allow any interests they have to affect, or be seen to affect the way they propose, provide or prescribe treatments, refer patients, or commission services
    • if faced with a conflict of interest, must be open about it with patients and employers, declare it in line with local arrangements, and be prepared to exclude themselves from decision making
    • must not ask for or accept – from patients, colleagues or others – any incentive payments, gifts or hospitality that may affect or be seen to affect the way they propose, provide or prescribe treatments, refer or commission services for patients, or offer such incentives to others
    • should, wherever possible, avoid providing medical care to themselves or anyone with whom they have a close personal relationship. They must seek independent medical advice on issues relating to their own health.

This also applies to you as a medical student.

Cooperating with legal and regulatory requirements

  1. To maintain patient safety, doctors must cooperate with formal inquiries, patient safety investigations, and complaints procedures. They must provide all relevant information and be open and honest. They must also tell the GMC without delay if, anywhere in the world:
    • they have accepted a caution (or equivalent) from a prosecuting authority
    • they have been charged with a criminal offence in person or by post
    • they have been found guilty of a criminal offence.
  2. You have a duty to cooperate with your medical school’s fitness to practise procedures that involve you or your colleagues. You also have a responsibility to tell your medical school immediately, and the GMC when you apply for provisional registration, if you:
    • accept a caution for a criminal offence while you are at medical school. A student on a course in Scotland will not have to disclose receipt of a caution to the medical school - because medical schools apply the law pertaining to the country in which they are based and in Scotland cautions do not have to be disclosed. However, a student on a course in Scotland will have to disclose receipt of a caution to the GMC when they apply for registration. Read more about protected cautions and convictions.
    • have been charged with or found guilty of a criminal offence while at medical school
    • have any serious concerns about the impact your health condition might have on your ability to practise.
  3. You should tell your medical school or higher education institution if you are the subject of any legal proceedings that could call into question your fitness to practise medicine as a doctor. You shouldn't wait until legal proceedings have been concluded before you do this.
  4. If you had any cautions  or convictions before you started medical school, and didn’t declare these on admission (unless they are protected), you should do so at the earliest opportunity. Note that the definition of protected cautions and convictions is different between England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. You need to refer to the definition that applies to the country where your course is based. As explained above, a student or applicant will not have to disclose a caution to a course based in Scotland upon admission.
  5. You must also tell your medical school, and the GMC when you apply for registration, if there has ever been a determination by a UK or overseas regulatory body that your fitness to practise as a member of that regulated profession is impaired. For example, nursing, dentistry or law.
  6. If you have any questions about what you should declare to the GMC or to your medical school, you should seek advice from your medical school, a medical defence organisation or the British Medical Association (BMA).

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