Sofia Reale, Luca Orecchia, Simona Ippoliti, Simone Pletto, Serena Pastore, Stefano Germani, Alessandra Nardi, Roberto Miano
Urology Unit, CHUV - Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, Lausanne, Switzerland.
Urology Unit, Policlinico Tor Vergata Foundation, Rome, Italy.
Front Surg. 2022 Jul 29;9:962824. doi: 10.3389/fsurg.2022.962824. eCollection 2022.
Despite the well-established worldwide phenomenon of "the feminisation of medicine," in Italy, Urology remains a male-dominated field.
The aims of our work are to assess data on medical students' choice of surgical specialty in Italy to investigate if a gender-biased trend exists and to find the key points that influence the decision-making process when choosing a specialty, with a focus on Urology.
Data about access to residency programs in 2017-2020 were analysed through descriptive statistics. Investigations concerning the decision-making process were carried through distribution of an online anonymous survey to Italian medical students.
Urology was among the specialties with the lowest proportion of female residents in Italy in the last 4 years: 37 (29.4%) in 2017, 27 (21.4%) in 2018, 40 (26.7%) in 2019, and 57 (25.2%) in 2020. The total number of participants of the survey was 1409, of which only 341 declared being keen to pursue a career path in surgery. Out of the 942 students not interested in surgery, 46.2% females and 22.5% males indicated a "sexist environment" as one of the reasons. Overall, the main reason for medical students not choosing Urology is the lack of interest in the specialty. Furthermore, there is a different perception of Urology as a sexist environment between female (23.4%) and male (3.2%, < 0.001) medical students, which may influence their decision-making process.
In Italy, the prevalence of female medical graduates does not mirror the proportion of female doctors choosing a career in some surgical specialties, including Urology. Our survey results clearly identified that a large proportion of medical graduates are not choosing urology because of the perception of a sexist environment. While the reasons for this phenomenon remain unclear, the presence of a gender-biased perception of a sexist environment represents a possible explanation.
尽管“医学女性化”是一种在全球范围内已被充分证实的现象，但在意大利，泌尿外科仍然是一个男性主导的领域。
我们这项工作的目的是评估意大利医学生选择外科专业的数据，以调查是否存在性别偏见趋势，并找出影响专业选择决策过程的关键点，重点关注泌尿外科。
通过描述性统计分析2017 - 2020年住院医师培训项目准入的数据。关于决策过程的调查通过向意大利医学生发放在线匿名调查问卷来进行。
在过去4年里，泌尿外科是意大利女性住院医师比例最低的专业之一：2017年有37名（29.4%），2018年有27名（21.4%），2019年有40名（26.7%），2020年有57名（25.2%）。调查的参与者总数为1409人，其中只有341人表示热衷于从事外科职业。在942名对外科不感兴趣的学生中，46.2%的女性和22.5%的男性表示“性别歧视的环境”是原因之一。总体而言，医学生不选择泌尿外科的主要原因是对该专业缺乏兴趣。此外，女性（23.4%）和男性（3.2%，P < 0.001）医学生对泌尿外科作为性别歧视环境的认知存在差异，这可能会影响他们的决策过程。
在意大利，医学女毕业生的比例与选择某些外科专业（包括泌尿外科）职业的女医生比例并不相符。我们的调查结果清楚地表明，很大一部分医学毕业生不选择泌尿外科是因为他们认为存在性别歧视的环境。虽然这种现象的原因尚不清楚，但对性别歧视环境存在性别偏见的认知可能是一种解释。
