Do Women or Men Make the Best Doctors?

[AMCoffeePMWine]

This study from Canada is very interesting. Asking if the reason for better outcomes is because current doctors coming out of Med school have more up to date skills.

www.webmd.com/a-to-z-guides/news/20210719/do-women-or-men-make-the-best-doctors?ecd=soc_tw_210721_cons_news_doctorstudy&linkId=100000056171192

There've been a few studies concluding better outcomes from female docs.

The recently trained thing though- certainly in the UK women have been docs for ages.

Unusually high suicide rate in female GPS.

There could be any number of reasons TBH

So many variables but I have found that female GP’s actually listen to me whereas male ones tend to talk at me so I don’t see make doctors any more.

Certainly women receive fewer complaints, and referrals to the GMC.

Men are vastly more likely than women to be investigated and sanctioned by the regulator.

There are good doctors and bad doctors in both sexes.
And I speak as a retired hospital doctor who worked directly with hundreds over 36 years. I don’t think you can base judgment on relative numbers of GMC referrals - I think women are possibly better at defusing complaints before they reach that stage, more willing to apologise or admit mistakes, but they still make them.
One risks descending to sexist stereotypes when comparing the qualities required for high risk surgical specialists versus GPs - the former needing self confidence verging on arrogance and the latter empathy with emotional/social/psych problems, for example. I have known wonderfully empathic male GPs who have cried with patients over bereavement, and some very hardbitten female surgeons!

From my experience with being chronically ill, over a decade , overall I've found male drs to be far better but I think I just don't tend to gel with other women as well in general.

I agree with babdoc and think that self-selection of specialty and persistence of stereotypes is a major issue.

Also the level of antisocial hours between specialties, which also leads those who cannot arrange the rest of their life around them to move away from some options (this reinforcing stereotypes?)

It's more Ok for a man to walk away from his family to work all hours ithe high risk high pressure fields. Less so for a woman.

And it is those fields which see the most deaths/adverse outcomes

Really?

What kind of genitals you have makes you better at something?

Peeing standing up excepted of course.

In countries where it is still more difficult to get into medicine as a woman, the women will be of a higher standard as they have to be that much better to get in in the first place.

I've worked with a lot of medical students and the working class students are far better than those from the "top" schools, because they needed to work harder and be better to get in and they don't come from a place where it's an expectation or a status symbol to be a medic (an attitude which dilutes the quality in the well off group) - they really want to do it. If this sort of bias is affecting female applicants in Canada, then I would expect them to be better.

However, I don't think there is an intrinsically sex based reason they are better, except perhaps in woman's health, where they would understand how much we put up with in terms of period pain etc. before making a fuss.

Surely people who are intelligent and insightful and kind and caring make the best doctors. No relationship to sex.

If biases in med school etc mean that different sorts of people get through the selection process, that is something to fix.

parietal, that isn’t true for many surgical specialties, where the doctor needs to be able to emotionally detach from the patient, cut them open and work on organs such as the brain or heart, with a high risk of death or damage. The qualities required there are unshakeable self confidence and a detachment bordering on psychopathy!
There is a need for all types of personality in different medical careers. Many years ago, we divided surgeons into “nice but useless” and “bastard but excellent”!

As with a lot of these sort of professions, men do it for the money, women do it because they care.

I really think this is something where you can't generalise based on sex at all I've just had an emergency operation and while I would say my male surgeons were very self confident and a bit of arrogance was there no doubt, they were all really kind and took the trouble to explain things and let me call my family. I have also had some really good doctors and nurses both male and female and some less good again of both sexes. I think either sex can have the personality and aptitude to make them good at their job and it's that individual who has just the right combination for each specialty. Whilst women have been involved in medicine for a long time it's still harder for a woman to reach the very top so it does make sense that the top women in their field are probably the best of the best and very dedicated so that might explain why they show such good outcomes, but I think given a level playing field things would be very equal between sexes.

@Babdoc

parietal, that isn’t true for many surgical specialties, where the doctor needs to be able to emotionally detach from the patient, cut them open and work on organs such as the brain or heart, with a high risk of death or damage. The qualities required there are unshakeable self confidence and a detachment bordering on psychopathy! There is a need for all types of personality in different medical careers. Many years ago, we divided surgeons into “nice but useless” and “bastard but excellent”!

Totally agree, it always annoys me when empathy is highlighted as the one big assets to have as a medic. Some personalities, as you describe in your post will make excellent doctors even if their communication skills aren't completely up to scratch.

I carefully didn't say empathy in my description. I know you definitely want a surgeon to be focused & excellent during surgery, but also s/he needs to be kind when meeting with the patient before / after.

there is an interesting distinction between empathy & compassion. empathy = feeling another persons pain. Too much is not good for medical staff & leads to burnout
compassion = feeling kindness & desire to help. That is what you want in a doctor.

see Tania Singer here

My own personal experiences means I try to ask for a female GP where possible. When I was a new mum I took my 2 week old DD to see a male GP to look at suspected tongue tie and was made to feel like I was wasting his time - I was a sleep deprived first time mum and just needed a bit of reassurance. I went back again a few weeks later with chronic mastitis (caused by the tongue tie the male GP said wasn’t there!) and saw a lovely female GP who listened, sympathised (telling me she struggled with BF too) and let me have a sob on her metaphorical shoulder.

Recent younger female gps have been bloody amazingly on the ball re thyroid management. 2 Absolutely determined to keep me on a higher dose that had my tsh at 0.3/0.2. Two male gps at the same practice wanted it to be around 2; where I was struggling. The women have also readily agreed, on separate occasions, to let me try to raise my ferritin and get a repeat test. It wasn't low enough to be given iron. One even suggested some diet changes along the FODMAPs route and retest ferritin after a month. And amazingly it went up.

Both thyroid and ferritin levels can be battles for some women which many gps aren't great on.

As with a lot of these sort of professions, men do it for the money, women do it because they care.

Ridiculous sexist stereotyping I didn't expect to see on this board.

I’ve had mixed experiences with GPs. Gynaecologists however I would prefer a man (I would now travel the length of the country to see the same gynaecologist after seeing so many awful ones). I’ve never had a painful examination by a man but lots from women.

Surely it’s impossible to come to any valid conclusion on this? There must be so many confounding factors. Are the numbers statistically significant? It’s normally stated if they are.
Medical specialities differ, men and women differ, people differ. There are far better questions that could be asked, directly relating to women’s practice and career prospects.

Thatsmydaughterinthewater

So many variables but I have found that female GP’s actually listen to me whereas male ones tend to talk at me so I don’t see make doctors any more

Female doctor I have at the moment is truly awful at listening. I swear she hears voices in her head and thinks they are me.
I asked was there anything that would help me sleep, I have terrible insomnia.
Her reply was she couldn’t prescribe me 500 sleeping pills.
Did I ask for 500 sleeping pill?

Asked if I could see some one about allergy testing
Her reply was that there was no place you can go to do allergy testing.
I said I knew there was and she told me it was all in my mind

Had to wait for a locum and he referred me.

She is the first female doctor I have had and it has put me right off having another

I find this whole thing a bit counterproductive tbh. There are personality traits which suit different specialities for sure and there are personality traits which are encouraged in girls and boys and that is where the likely root is.

I must admit I’ve bristled somewhat at the suggestion that surgeons are poor communicators or detached / borderline psychopathic. And actually offended on my (male) colleagues behalf - I can think of only one that I think doesn’t care especially about his patients (but is an excellent surgeon) and the rest do very much care and are sympathetic towards them. Having said that, I am constantly asked whether I’d mind breaking bad news as there is a perception that my ovaries mean I’m suddenly more qualified than them to do it, hence not finding this whole discussion very helpful.

Women are much more suited to caring professions than men. This study proves it.

Are they?

I didn't know that.

I know loads of blokes in care roles and they love their jobs.

Care roles of many types are low paid. (Not doctors obv!)

Is it that women are suited to them, or is it that women need the money more?

Where they are better paid and more men do them are they seen as care roles in the same way?
Physiotherapy
Psychology/ counselling
Rehabilitation/ occupational therapy
Vicars etc (theoretically doesn't always work that way obv)
I'm sure there's loads

Psychiatric nurses used to often be men (don't know if still are). I used to know some massive great fellas

Women are much more suited to caring professions than men. This study proves it.

That's great to know. I was under the impression that sex didn't affect your ability to do jobs.
So, men = tech and science, women = caring professions, right?