No one person can truly understand disability. It is such a varied category with no two experiences being the same.

A wheelchair user cannot completely comprehend the life of someone who is blind; though they will each face challenges to navigate and access the world their issues and solutions will be very different. Nevertheless, they will undoubtedly face exclusion in some form. The individual’s experience of disability is influenced by multiple factors beyond the biological or genetic cause of the condition disabling them.

The society they live in determines the level of structural organisational support they will receive for independent living. While some disabled individuals have resources denied to others more commonly disabled people experience poverty and social exclusion in addition to their personal health challenges. 

Societal inequity was highlighted for many disabled people during the pandemic. We saw disproportionate policies and treatment of disabled individuals; from the loss of disabled car parking spaces to queuing areas, to inaccessible vaccine centres, all the way to inappropriate DNACPR orders owing to assumptions and biases. While some difference in mortality will be explained by clinical risk profiles, many disabled people and their families feel negative outcomes were influenced by systemic bias in medicine and beyond. As a disabled person myself I can tell you a lot of us felt completely invisible.

It would be difficult to write a blog for disability history month without mentioning the loss of one of our brightest torches in the crusade for equality: Alice Wong – author of Disability Visibility. In her heartfelt goodbye to the community last week, she referred to herself as a disability ancestor and that is exactly what disability history month should prompt us to reflect on; all those who came before us and the battles they have fought on our behalf.

The only way the marginalised make progress is by continually and loudly demanding that we are involved in the shaping of the world and defending our rights. In short asking to not only exist but participate fully. In that spirit I will now turn to another of those ancestors. 

Those that know me would not be surprised to hear that a queer, disabled, woman of colour, who was an artist and a revolutionary is one of my most cherished historical figures … but there she sits proudly on the podium. This disability history month I’ve been reflecting on her life and politics, and the lessons that I take from her legacy. She is of course Frida Kahlo. While her face is famous, her life of pain and disability is less common knowledge.

She often disguised what she referred to as an ‘imperfect body’ using her ostentatious dresses. This desire to hide something we as disabled people are told is defective, is one reason disability is often relegated to the margins of the history books. Though bold in her difference Frida was no stranger to ableism. Some of which we now know was clearly internalised: but as with any true feminist icon, ‘nevertheless, she persisted’.

While privately she may have had her struggles with her body’s limitations, she publicly embraced her identity. In a body of artistic work, advocacy and political activism she embodied the personal as political: demonstrating her intimate understanding that experiences of pain, sexism, racism and disability were rooted in deeper social and political issues. While attitudes have progressed since the 1920s, this is something that remains true in modern society and is something I think we can all appreciate in such a turbulent current moment.  

Disabled people are so often told by society that they are unwanted or defective; it is exactly why historically disabled people would attempt to hide their problems, or else be hidden by family. This is the influence of the medical model in which disability of any kind is seen as something that must require fixing. In actuality, it is the physical and metaphorical barriers to disabled people’s inclusion in everyday life that need addressing. 

Disabled experience is often a continual fight to have our needs met and through this experience disabled doctors bring valuable insight of creatively navigating the health and social care system. They understand the administrative burden of ill health, as well as the discrimination they often face. This knowledge is crucial to implementing change for more inclusive and empathetic health care services.

Even more obscure than her disability is that prior to her disabling accident, a young Kahlo had aspirations of medical study. We have come some way since then; disability no longer completely bars someone from medical studies – but there are still major roadblocks that exist. The BMA disability survey is damning evidence of this; as a disabled trainee it was a difficult read. However, my personal experience was reflected so accurately in the responses that it at least delivered some comfort that I am far from alone in feeling that ableism is a problem in institutions in the same way as racism and misogyny.

The reports in recent years have been difficult to digest. But as with any injustice the key is to acknowledge the problem, call it out and then push together for change, even – and perhaps especially – when we have not experienced these problems ourselves. The disabled community is the biggest and most intersectional minority that we have, comprising 25% of the UK population; and it is constantly growing. Anyone can become disabled at any point in life, and the pandemic was a mass disabling event. Long COVID alone is affecting 120,000 NHS workers.

It is therefore essential healthcare environments improve accessibility and support disabled and neurodivergent medical students and doctors to continue their careers by actively engaging able-bodied colleagues in allyship and advocacy and compassionate support for disabled doctors and medical students.

The BMA is working to improve support for doctors and medical students who are disabled, neurodivergent and/or have long-term health conditions. The full findings of the 2025 disability and neurodivergence survey will be published soon.

Georgina Budd is a GP trainee based in Wales. She is the equality representative for the BMA Welsh resident doctors committee and a member of the BMA EDI Advisory Group