International Women’s Day

International Women’s Day (IWD) is an annual global celebration on 8 March that shines a spotlight on important issues including gender equality, and highlights the achievements of women worldwide. This year’s theme of #EmbraceEquity inspired us to highlight highlights six ways we’re embracing equity and working to create a surgical culture where everyone feels respected and valued.

Our Women in Surgery (WinS) network is dedicated to encouraging, enabling and inspiring women to fulfil their surgical career ambitions. To mark IWD, WinS Twitter and the RCS England Instagram shared photos and videos celebrating female diplomates at our ceremonies, Emerging Leaders, role models and more. Wondering what a typical day in the life of a surgeon looks like? Watch our story highlights to see a behind the scenes takeover from RCS England member and general surgeon, Scarlet Nazarian (@thefemalesurgeon).

An exciting and inspiring day of Diplomates Ceremonies in our home of surgery culminated in an IWD evening networking reception, where we heard from the first female professor of surgery in the UK and founder of WinS, Professor Averil Mansfield, and had a keynote talk from Associate Professor Rhea Liang, a general and breast surgeon on the Gold Coast in Australia. From discussions around making women surgeons ‘ordinary’ to the small acts we can all do to make people feel like they belong, it was an evening not to be missed. In case you did, you can stream the recording from our YouTube.

While we like to #LiftAsYouClimb and spotlight women year-round, IWD does provide a special opportunity for us to come together and celebrate. To hear more from inspiring women surgeons, register for free for our WinS network and save the date for our conference, taking place on Thursday 14 September.