Just two fifths of doctors attended non-selective state schools, while a third were privately educated. Medicine is a very popular career choice, the guidance says, with fierce competition for places at university.

In a 30-page document titled A Journey to Medicine: Outreach Guidance, the Medical Schools Council said: The medical schools are determined to make a difference to social mobility in the UK.

It sets out a series of ways medical schools can increase their intake of pupils from poorer backgrounds.

Among the recommendations are that they should help support individual learners to make successful applications to medicine.

As part of this assistance, they should be aiming to offer support to students to make an application to medical school including writing personal statements and preparing for interviews and admissions tests, the guidance states.

It highlights the example of Brighton and Sussex Medical School which has introduced a five-year scheme targeting people from a low-social-economic group background with the potential to become doctors. Medical students, faculty staff and doctors teach pupils about clinical skills and the human body, as well as advising them on their applications to the Brighton-Sussex Medical School or other institutions.

The guidance also suggests that the journey to medicine should start in primary schools.

Pupils should be told about the qualifications and routes to becoming a doctor, the guidance says, and take part in lively and fun activities linked to the profession.

Medical students acting as ambassadors are often the best people to lead activity, which can include demonstrations, campus tours and mentoring, it says.

Some medical schools formally recognise this work by medical students as part of their educational development.

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Medical schools 'should help poorer pupils with applications'