Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Weill Institute for Neurosciences, University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), California, USA.
San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, San Francisco, California, USA.
J Womens Health (Larchmt). 2022 Oct;31(10):1403-1410. doi: 10.1089/jwh.2022.0048. Epub 2022 Jun 14.
As medical training occurs during prime childbearing years, parental leave policies may affect the career and family choices of medical students. This cross-sectional study builds on existing research by quantifying the prevalence of formal policies for parental leave in highly ranked United States Medical Degree granting institutions, and analyzing the characteristics of those policies, with the objective of identifying existing best practices for future policy adopters to consider. Only 14% of the medical schools reviewed had substantive, stand-alone parental leave policies, and the majority of schools had leave of absence policies without mention of parental leave. Leveraging the authors' legal and medical expertise, this analysis highlights existing best practices for medical school leadership to consider, as they examine and develop their policies. Best practices utilized by institutions with the most robust parental policies include adopting a formal and public parental policy, providing a parental enrolled academic adjustment option, guaranteeing approval to take and return from leave/academic adjustment, and continuing health care and financial aid benefits. Given the role of childbearing as a factor associated with gender disparities in academic medicine, and potential impact on racial disparities for students of color, medical school leadership should consider implementation of best practice parental policies to promote equity and wellness of their students. In fact, the deficit of robust parental leave policies in most highly ranked schools may contribute to existing gender and racial disparities in violation with antidiscrimination law. Strengthening policies could increase equity in medical education with positive impacts on the patient population.
由于医学培训通常发生在生育高峰期，因此父母假政策可能会影响医学生的职业和家庭选择。这项横断面研究通过量化美国排名靠前的医学学位授予机构中正式的父母假政策的流行程度，并分析这些政策的特点，进一步了解现有的最佳实践，为未来的政策制定者提供参考。在被审查的医学院中，只有 14%的学校制定了实质性的、独立的父母假政策，而大多数学校的休假政策都没有提到父母假。利用作者的法律和医学专业知识，本分析强调了医学院领导层在审查和制定政策时应考虑的现有最佳实践。拥有最完善父母政策的机构采用的最佳实践包括：制定正式且公开的父母政策、提供父母注册的学业调整选项、保证休假/学业调整的批准、并继续提供医疗保健和经济援助福利。鉴于生育对学术医学中的性别差距以及对有色人种学生的种族差距的潜在影响，医学院领导层应考虑实施最佳实践的父母假政策，以促进学生的公平和健康。事实上，大多数顶尖学校缺乏强有力的父母假政策，这可能违反了反歧视法，导致现有的性别和种族差距。加强政策可以提高医学教育的公平性，并对患者群体产生积极影响。
