This email has been sent on behalf of Dr Harriet Gordon President, British Society of Gastroenterology
Dear Colleague
As you know, earlier this year the BSG invited applications for our Trainee Unrestricted Educational Bursary, offering a £300 grant as a contribution towards the cost of the European Specialty Examination in Gastroenterology and Hepatology (ESEGH). We were delighted to receive your application, one of 136 received before 1st July.
Since launching this year's application process, there has been an important national development which you are no doubt aware of. Resident doctors have voted to accept the Government's latest pay and conditions offer, which includes reimbursement in full of the first two attempts at each Royal College examination for resident doctors in training and locally employed doctors (LEDs). This reimbursement applies to examinations sat from 1 April 2026.
We are delighted that trainees who sat the ESEGH examination from April 2026 will now be eligible to have the full cost of their examination reimbursed, rather than receiving a partial contribution through the BSG bursary.
In light of this welcome change, the BSG Council has taken the decision to withdraw the current round of the grants with immediate effect, as continuing the scheme would duplicate funding already being provided. We appreciate that you may be disappointed, particularly as you have already taken the time to apply for the bursary. However, we hope you will agree that full reimbursement of your examination fees represents a significantly better outcome for you than the original £300 grant.
As a result, we are now in discussions with the BSG Trainee Section Committee about how we can make the best use of the funding originally allocated to this bursary and how it could be used to provide the greatest possible benefit for trainees in the future. If you wish to, you are invited to discuss the topic with your Trainee reps. The BSG remains committed to investing in trainee education and development and we hope to be able to launch some new initiatives very soon, so watch this space!
Yours sincerely
Dr Harriet Gordon
President, British Society of Gastroenterology