Medical student's bid to fix funding system

A NEWCASTLE medical student is among would-be doctors highlighting a funding gap that means he needs to work two jobs to afford to study to become a doctor.

- By SAM VOLPE

Henry Budden, 24, is a Heaton-based medical student at Newcastle University. Last month, with hundreds of others, he delivered a demand to the Department for Education to 'fix our funding'. Henry is deputy co-chair of the BMA's medical students committee.

The issue occurs because students from the fifth year of an undergraduate medical course or second year of a postgraduate course do not receive Student Finance England means-tested maintenance loans.

Instead they must apply for an NHS bursary. But this does not match the funding they'd have received before and means, according to the BMA, up to nine in ten students in that position report not being able to cover their costs.

Which is why students like Henry need to take on second jobs despite the fact they are often on full-time placements in hospitals around the country.