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The Study Veterinary Medicine Should Be Paying Attention To

In 2025 the British Medical Association published the results of a national survey examining disability and neurodivergence within the medical profession.

More than 800 doctors and medical students participated.

The findings are confronting, not because they reveal cruelty or obvious discrimination. Most healthcare workplaces would reject those behaviours outright. What the report reveals instead is something quieter and far more difficult to confront.

It shows how the structure and culture of healthcare professions themselves can gradually push disabled clinicians out of the workforce

For veterinary medicine, the report should land as more than an interesting piece of research from another profession. It should feel uncomfortably familiar.

The pressures described in the report are not unique to medicine. They are deeply embedded in the culture of many clinical professions.

And the mechanisms the study describes are exactly the kinds of dynamics that veterinary medicine often misreads as something else.

Burnout.
Workload.
Attrition.

The BMA report suggests something deeper may sometimes be at play. In many ways, it echoes concerns that some of us working in inclusion and workforce sustainability have been raising for years.

Takeaway 1: Many clinicians believe ableism is worse inside medicine than outside it

One of the most striking findings in the survey was how respondents viewed their own profession.

70% said ableism was an issue in their workplace or training environment.

More surprising still: 56% believed ableism was more of an issue within medicine than in wider society.

This may sound paradoxical. Healthcare professions exist to treat illness and disability. Yet the culture of medicine often prizes endurance, perfectionism and productivity. Working beyond limits is normalised. Exhaustion is worn as a badge of honour. Needing support can be interpreted as weakness.

When those expectations become cultural norms, clinicians whose bodies or minds function differently can quickly find themselves outside the profession’s narrow definition of what competence looks like.

Takeaway 2: Lack of support is pushing clinicians toward the exit

Perhaps the most alarming finding in the report relates to retention. 53% of respondents had either left a job or considered leaving the medical profession in the past two years due to lack of support for their disability or health condition.

This reframes ableism as more than an equity issue. It becomes a workforce sustainability issue.

Healthcare professions often focus heavily on recruitment. Yet if clinicians are leaving because the profession cannot accommodate them, then the pipeline problem begins much further downstream.

I speak to many veterinarians and veterinary nurses where this exact scenario is playing out, and the conversations are too frequent for me to ignore.

Takeaway 3: Career progression barriers are widespread

The survey also revealed how disability can quietly reshape career trajectories. 63% of respondents said lack of support had been a barrier to their career progression.

Respondents described several mechanisms:

• Difficulties accessing adjustments for professional exams

• Needing to work additional hours to compensate for inaccessible systems

• Slower progression through training pathways

• Being discouraged from pursuing certain specialties

More than a third of respondents reported being discouraged from entering particular specialties because of disability.

These experiences will resonate with many clinicians across healthcare.

Early in my own veterinary career, as a new graduate, I was told directly that a profoundly deaf person did not belong in veterinary medicine. Even earlier than that, I had to sit an entry interview to get into veterinary science. I was the only one from my cohort, and for many years before and after, to do sit a pre-admissions interview. In that interview I was asked questions about how I would cope in a circle yard full of horses running around me and how I would manage the safety aspects.

All of these comments were framed as concern.

The profession was described as communication-heavy, fast paced, risky.

Comments like that are forms of gate-keeping and shape careers long before ability is ever tested.

Takeaway 4: Accessing adjustments can become a battle

The survey also examined access to workplace adjustments.

Among respondents who required adjustments, 73% said they had not received all the adjustments they needed. Only 20% were satisfied with the process for accessing adjustments. And 43% had paid for adjustments themselves, despite legally being entitled to have the adjustments provided for them.

Many respondents described the process as exhausting. Requests were slow. Processes were unclear. Responsibility was often passed between departments. What was in play is the phenomenon that organisational psychology calls strategic inefficiency.

Clinicians found themselves repeatedly negotiating with administrative systems simply to obtain the tools that would allow them to do their jobs effectively. The increased cognitive load was usually invisible to others, but wore them down over time.

Takeaway 5: Disclosure remains risky

The survey also highlighted the risks clinicians perceive around disclosing disability or neurodivergence.

Even among those who had disclosed: only one third reported that disclosure resulted in improved support.

Many respondents described fears that disclosure could lead to:

• Negative judgement

• Reduced opportunities

• Increased scrutiny of their performance

As a result, many clinicians choose not to disclose at all. Invisibility creates a dangerous illusion. If disability remains hidden within the workforce, organisations assume it is rare. Veterinary surgeon’s boards around Australia frequently state disability disclosure rates less than 1%. These numbers do not reflect reality. They reflect powerful cultures of silence.

And if organisations assume it is rare, systems remain designed for a narrow set of abilities.

Takeaway 6: Bullying and harassment remain common

The survey also documented significant levels of mistreatment. 34% of respondents reported experiencing bullying or harassment related to disability.

Even more concerning was what happened after reporting. Only 5% of those who reported incidents were satisfied with the outcome.

This suggests that formal reporting systems alone cannot solve the problem if organisational cultures remain unchanged.

The Deeper Pattern

Perhaps the most important insight from the BMA report is that ableism in healthcare rarely appears as overt hostility. Instead it is embedded in systems and expectations.

Respondents described several structural contributors:

• Service pressures and understaffing

• Rigid working patterns

• Cultures that glorify endurance and presenteeism

• The belief that clinicians should operate at the limits of stamina

When those expectations become the norm, needing flexibility or support can easily be interpreted as underperformance.

The Disability Reality Most Professions Miss

Another reason this issue deserves attention is that many people still misunderstand disability itself. Many people still imagine disability as something rare or visible. In reality, neither is true.

Around 80% of disability is invisible. And around 80% of disability is acquired rather than present at birth. Disability is also strongly linked to age.

Across the Australian workforce, around 22% of working-age adults live with disability.
By retirement age, that figure rises to around 52%. In other words, disability is not something that affects a small group of people outside the profession. It is something that many people will experience during their working lives.

Many clinicians who enter healthcare professions without disability will acquire disability, chronic illness or health conditions over time. And that statistic does not even account for neurodivergence or chronic illness, which are often underreported in disability datasets.

A Wake-Up Call for Veterinary Medicine

Veterinary medicine has not yet studied ableism within its workforce in the same depth as human medicine. Which means we do not yet know how many veterinary professionals experience similar barriers.

But we do know one thing: The Australian Veterinary Association recently reported that 38% of veterinarians identify as having a disability, neurodivergence or chronic illness.

More than one in three.

If even a fraction of the dynamics identified in the BMA report are present within veterinary medicine, then this cannot be a marginal issue within our profession. It could be shaping the experiences of a substantial portion of the workforce.

And it could be quietly contributing to the problems we currently describe using other language:

Burnout.
Attrition.
Workforce shortages.

Sometimes what looks like burnout may actually be something else.

Sometimes it is what happens when a profession built around narrow assumptions of ability collides with the reality of the people working inside it.

The BMA report should prompt an uncomfortable question.

If human medicine has begun collecting this data and confronting these patterns, why hasn’t veterinary medicine?

If more than a third of veterinarians live with disability, neurodivergence or chronic illness, then understanding their experiences is not optional. It is essential.

Until we start collecting our own data and examining these patterns honestly, we risk misunderstanding some of the forces shaping the future of the profession.

Professions do not only shape who enters, they also shape who quietly disappears along the way.