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While the # of female physicians has been increasing and is approaching 50%, the truth is for most medical specialties, a work life just isn't that compatible with a family life.
I'm graduating med school soon, and most of the men in my class are in relationships or married, many with kids, while most of the women are single, and even among the men who are single, most are single by choice and not by circumstance.
That's not to say that it's impossible to have a family, many female doctors do. It's just that its considerably more difficult. Even into their 60's, I know more single women doctors than men. In fact, I know no male doctors that age who are single.
I think, unfortunately, a lot of men are still intimidated by a female physician, and this makes dating as a female physician (or even medical student) difficult.
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Originally Posted by keraT
Interesting read,
another reason I have to say is men take greater risk than women. MEd school is great risk, long year of study high risk of not passing thru. Most female scare away & go for someone more reliable.
Risk aversion as a decision factor into whether or not to pursue a career in medicine? I had not even thought of that. Interesting perspective and I can definitely see some aspects of that.
I am surprised noone has mentioned this, but the reason there have not been a lot of female physicians is due to one reason only: discrimination. Historically, women were looked down upon as inferior and in the 50s-60s, you would be hard-pressed to find any female doctors. Medicine as a field is highly conservative, traditional, and oftentimes outright sexist. It truly has been a "good ole boy club."
Times are changing though and medical school classes now have equal male-female admission ratios. This was not achieved until the 2000s! Did women just get smarter or more qualified? I don't think so. Some subspecialties especially the sub-surgical ones still discriminate. I have seen orthopedic residencies even admit female interns for the first time in their history and noone knew what to do. Noone knew how to act around "the girl." Hell, when I finished residency less than a decade ago, they still gave our incoming female interns a talk on "being a woman in medicine" which basically addressed how to deal with discrimination.
According to the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, this is the gender distribution in U.S. medical schools for 2014: Males - 9,499
Females - 8,579
In the following states, female enrollment exceeded male enrollment:
CT, DC, GA, HI, MA, NV, NH, NJ, NM, OR, RI, SC, WA.
No data were available for Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Guam, and the Virgin Islands.
I think, unfortunately, a lot of men are still intimidated by a female physician, and this makes dating as a female physician (or even medical student) difficult.
Risk aversion as a decision factor into whether or not to pursue a career in medicine? I had not even thought of that. Interesting perspective and I can definitely see some aspects of that.
Most men aren't intimidated by female physicians. From what I've observed, most female physicians tend to think that because they're doctors men should fall at their feet and be impressed with them, and it just so happens that most men don't actually care what a woman does for a living in general. After a while my female colleagues tend to chill out though.
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Originally Posted by Swack
I am surprised noone has mentioned this, but the reason there have not been a lot of female physicians is due to one reason only: discrimination. Historically, women were looked down upon as inferior and in the 50s-60s, you would be hard-pressed to find any female doctors. Medicine as a field is highly conservative, traditional, and oftentimes outright sexist. It truly has been a "good ole boy club."
Times are changing though and medical school classes now have equal male-female admission ratios. This was not achieved until the 2000s! Did women just get smarter or more qualified? I don't think so. Some subspecialties especially the sub-surgical ones still discriminate. I have seen orthopedic residencies even admit female interns for the first time in their history and noone knew what to do. Noone knew how to act around "the girl." Hell, when I finished residency less than a decade ago, they still gave our incoming female interns a talk on "being a woman in medicine" which basically addressed how to deal with discrimination.
Female matriculants actually have lower Science GPAs and MCATs than Males. So, no. Also, I call BS on surgical subs still discriminating against admitting women when women are the ones deciding to apply for what residencies they want. Most women flat out don't want to do alot of the surgical subs, they're ridiculously competitive, the residency hours are long and they suck ass.
As for some specialties being gender-dominated, why is it that it's always a crisis when women are underrepresented but no push for increased male representation in many fields? Women run OB-GYN like a cartel, and you lot are overrepresented in Paeds as well as in more lucrative specialties like Derm
Last edited by lexdiamondz1902; 04-10-2015 at 03:19 AM..
I have seen orthopedic residencies even admit female interns for the first time in their history and noone knew what to do. Noone knew how to act around "the girl." Hell, when I finished residency less than a decade ago, they still gave our incoming female interns a talk on "being a woman in medicine" which basically addressed how to deal with discrimination.
My husband is an Orthopaedic surgeon, and I agree that of all the specialities, it is the most male dominated and has a lot of vestiges of the "Good ol boys" club around. Conversely, there are some Ortho programs that go out of their way and bend over backwards to attract female qualified female candidates. My husband worked with several female surgeons who were among the best surgeons he has ever encountered. One was a female Dept Chair. He also had 2 female co-residents while he was training that were far and away, the weakest in his program, both technically and on the in-training exams. On more than one occasion, there was one female resident in particular who was physically incapable of doing procedures. She was a Senior while he was a Junior and she needed his help reducing a hip. After that, he lost all respect for her. This issue is very limited, however, because Ortho is probably the only medical specialty where brute force is a requirement, and even then, those situations are relatively limited.
Quote:
Originally Posted by lexdiamondz1902
As for some specialties being gender-dominated, why is it that it's always a crisis when women are underrepresented but no push for increased male representation in many fields? Women run OB-GYN like a cartel, and you lot are overrepresented in Paeds as well as in more lucrative specialties like Derm
Agree with these examples. If Ortho and surgical sub-fields are still dominated by men, then these above specialties are overwhelmingly female. The problem is, as has been pointed out, that the specialties women gravitate towards are lower paying. There is no reason that women can't go into surgical specialties in larger numbers though. Residencies may be more malignant, but once you are in practice, lifestyle is often much easier than you would expect.
Medicine is becoming more female dominated and soon most medical specialties will be female dominated. As pay/prestige goes down, the balance of female > male will increase, as has happened in other career tracts over the years (ex. teaching). In some European countries, this is already the case.
Surgical specialties will likely remain male dominated because of the even longer training path, which is harder for women who want to have families. There was data in neurosurgery that the average divorce rate was > 100%.... (some divorced more than once!) which tells you a little something about the stress that that path can have on relationships.
It may be changing, read what this surgeon has to say about it.
Interesting article. Sounds like in the UK the government pays for a doctor's education? Seems like they might have to start instituting some rules, like requiring doctors to work a certain number of full time years or have to pay back a portion of their education costs.
Medicine is becoming like many other professional fields for women. For example, you will find lots of female lawyers and CPAs, but the majority of them work in small firms or in positions that have fewer hours and lower pay. If you look at the number of female directors and partners in big accounting and law firms where the pay is high but so are the hours and stress, you will find relatively few women. Women are just more likely than men to gravitate towards the jobs within a profession that have the least amount of time commitment and the most flexibility. It is slowly changing, but it will probably always be like that to a certain extent - unless someone invents a way for men to bear children.
From a patient's point of view, do you have any idea how frustrating it is to have your appointments cancelled, re-scheduled, etc because the "doctor's baby is sick". Being a mother and being a doctor are both jobs which carry a high degree of responsibility, on a consistent basis. You can't have it both ways, then expect everyone else to just rearrange their lives around you.
I prefer a male doctor for just this reason---I can expect him to be there when I've scheduled an appointment, and not be pre-empted for a more pressing responsibility.
There are more women doctors than men but you rarely see them because they only work part time.
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