In February 2021, the prestigious Journal of Hospital Medicine (JHS) published an article entitled: “Gender-Based Discrimination and Sexual Harassment Among Academic Internal Medicine Hospitalists.”
Why The Study
Sexual harassment of doctors in teaching hospitals? you may ask. Well, if so, it must be rude, misogynistic patients harassing doctors and nurses, right? In truth the dirty little secret that was rumored, was that in academic settings (major teaching hospitals) was that there were widespread cases of gender-based discrimination and sexual harassment. Think about that for a minute.
A woman completes undergraduate and sometimes graduate programs, then gains admission into a medical school. She goes through four grueling years and then applies for an internship and residency in internal medicine. Upon entry into that program, she is sexually harassed. Of course, it’s not just women but it predominantly happens to women.
While the societal mores have somewhat changed, and patients at least understand sexual harassment, medical colleagues of female (and sometimes male) physicians should know a whole heck of a lot better. The study was done to determine if the situation is true or myth.
To that end, 18 teaching hospitals of impeccable reputation sent surveys to 336 female and male internal medicine physicians. The results were, even to this speaker and sexual harassment prevention consultant, shocking.
Findings of Study
I will summarize the findings and then quote from the conclusion of the study.
- As might be expected, “female healthcare professionals more frequently reported inappropriate touch, sexual remarks, gestures, and suggestive looks by patients compared with male peers both over their careers.”
- Not surprising, female physicians were frequently referred to with “inappropriate terms of endearment (such as “dear,” “honey,” “sweetheart”).
- It followed that virtually every female physician was “mistaken by patients for nonphysician HCPs over their careers.”
- However (and here’s an even bigger problem): virtually every female physician at one time or another was mistaken for nonphysician healthcare providers by their colleagues. They were sexually harassed by their colleagues and they overall, feel a lessened sense of respect by their colleagues based on gender and worse, female respondents felt their gender “negatively impacted their career opportunities.”
The study concluded that “gender-based discrimination and sexual harassment are commonly encountered by academic hospitalists, with a significantly higher number of females reporting these experiences.”
A Lack of Leadership
As a speaker who has traversed the country speaking on sexual harassment and gender discrimination issues, I am (sadly) not at all surprised by the findings of the study. If I had a time machine and could travel to 1951, I might understand the inappropriateness of primarily female physicians being sexually harassed by colleagues. But this is 2021 and many core issues are unchanged.
I will concede that patients are capable of incredibly stupid and inappropriate actions and I’ve heard (and even witnessed) my fair share. However, the fact that female physicians are being sexually harassed, feel a lessened sense of respect up to and including a lack of career opportunities, is inexcusable in the present day.
It points to an endemic pattern inherent to the healthcare system that has yet to be addressed. It is clearly a lack of leadership and what I consider a dull and academic approach to an issue that is anything but academic and plodding in its being properly addressed. Sexual harassment is an issue that must be as forcefully addressed as is its hidden intent and meanings.
The leadership of academic hospitals are academic in their thinking. I am not being circular in my implication. Sexual harassment and gender discrimination must be addressed in a real and gut-level sense. The textbook whine must be replaced by direct and non-cerebral sense. In addition, issues such as these must be reinforced as virtually every other professional requirement.
If medicine is serious about celebrating and elevating women, than it must get serious about how those women are treated by their colleagues.
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