Even in 2014, the increased number of women in medicine is still believed to cause serious workforce problems and may even hurt patients. An article of Prof. Thomas, a British Surgeon lead to quite some furor at the beginning of 2014. The Medical Women´s Federation of UK responded to his article in January 2014.
Physicians need to realize that change is occurring in medical practice around the world and that we need to be on the forefront of the decision making process. As physicians have so much to offer society, how can we be proactive to ensure that Medicine does not become a Pink Collar Profession?
MWIA makes the following recommendations:
- Both our women and male physicians who have leadership potential must be mentored now for their future leadership roles. Once mentored they must be encouraged to undertaken these leadership roles.
- Society must move beyond blaming women physicians for the unpleasant changes that have affected the practice of medicine, but rather acknowledge the true reasons, which are lack of resources and third-party control.
- Established physicians must move beyond the insistence that the new graduates work as they have always worked. Let us move on to finding ways to deliver health care that will meet the needs of both the public and the physician. Bright minds are not going to be attracted to a profession that fails to provide job satisfaction, status, influence and lack of monetary reward.