Division of Hospital Medicine, Dell Medical School, The University of Texas at Austin, 1500 Red River Street, Austin, TX, 78701, USA.
University of Colorado School of Medicine, Aurora, CO, USA.
J Gen Intern Med. 2023 Nov;38(14):3180-3187. doi: 10.1007/s11606-023-08371-5. Epub 2023 Aug 31.
Women physicians have faced persistent challenges, including gender bias, salary inequities, a disproportionate share of caregiving and domestic responsibilities, and limited representation in leadership. Data indicate the COVID-19 pandemic further highlighted and exacerbated these inequities.
To understand the pandemic's impact on women physicians and to brainstorm solutions to better support women physicians.
Mixed-gender semi-structured focus groups.
Hospitalists in the Hospital Medicine Reengineering Network (HOMERuN).
Six semi-structured virtual focus groups were held with 22 individuals from 13 institutions comprised primarily of academic hospitalist physicians. Rapid qualitative methods including templated summaries and matrix analysis were applied to identify major themes and subthemes.
Four key themes emerged: (1) the pandemic exacerbated perceived gender inequities, (2) women's academic productivity and career development were negatively impacted, (3) women held disproportionate roles as caregivers and household managers, and (4) institutional pandemic responses were often misaligned with workforce needs, especially those of women hospitalists. Multiple interventions were proposed including: creating targeted workforce solutions and benefits to address the disproportionate caregiving burden placed on women, addressing hospitalist scheduling and leave practices, ensuring promotion pathways value clinical and COVID-19 contributions, creating transparency around salary and non-clinical time allocation, and ensuring women are better represented in leadership roles.
Hospitalists perceived and experienced that women physicians faced negative impacts from the pandemic in multiple domains including leadership opportunities and scholarship, while also shouldering larger caregiving duties than men. There are many opportunities to improve workplace conditions for women; however, current institutional efforts were perceived as misaligned to actual needs. Thus, policy and programmatic changes, such as those proposed by this cohort of hospitalists, are needed to advance equity in the workplace.
女性医生一直面临着诸多挑战，包括性别偏见、薪酬不平等、承担过多的照顾和家务责任，以及在领导层中代表性不足。数据表明，新冠疫情进一步凸显并加剧了这些不平等现象。
了解新冠疫情对女性医生的影响，并集思广益，寻找更好地支持女性医生的解决方案。
混合性别半结构化焦点小组。
医院医学再设计网络（HOMERuN）的医院医生。
在 13 家医院进行了 6 次半结构化虚拟焦点小组讨论，参与者主要由学术医院医生组成。采用快速定性方法，包括模板总结和矩阵分析，以确定主要主题和子主题。
出现了四个关键主题：（1）疫情加剧了感知到的性别不平等；（2）女性的学术生产力和职业发展受到负面影响；（3）女性承担了不成比例的照顾者和家庭管理者角色；（4）机构对疫情的应对措施往往与劳动力需求不一致，尤其是女性医院医生的需求。提出了多种干预措施，包括：制定有针对性的劳动力解决方案和福利，以解决女性承担的不成比例的照顾负担；解决医院医生的排班和休假做法；确保晋升途径重视临床和新冠疫情的贡献；提高薪酬和非临床时间分配的透明度；并确保女性在领导角色中得到更好的代表。
医院医生认为，女性医生在多个领域面临着疫情带来的负面影响，包括领导机会和学术研究，同时比男性承担更多的照顾责任。有很多机会可以改善女性的工作环境；然而，目前机构的努力被认为与实际需求不一致。因此，需要政策和计划的改变，如该批医院医生所提出的改变，以推进工作场所的公平。
