Difficulties arranging maternity leave, opting for “family friendly” specialities, and struggling to balance fertility treatment and work, are among the key findings of a new study exploring the experiences of women doctors in Ireland.
Researchers at the University of Galway, supported by the Medical Protection Society (MPS) Foundation, surveyed over 770 women doctors, including those with experiences of infertility, pregnancy loss or complications, and with children of all ages.
69% of participants felt their maternity leave was a burden to colleagues. Fewer than half (47%) found it easy to arrange maternity leave with their training programme, and the same amount were unhappy with the duration of their leave.
59% also felt family considerations had influenced their career paths - particularly GPs - a speciality often considered more “family friendly” than others, such as surgery.
Crucially, among the women doctors who reported fertility issues and had sought treatment, 86% reported overall difficulty in navigating treatment while working as a doctor.
Researchers said the findings, published in BMC Women's Health, suggest more could be done to support women doctors in raising families while continuing to thrive professionally.
Dr Sinéad Lydon, from the University of Galway’s Medicine and Motherhood (MAM) research team, said: “The MAM project explores how balancing motherhood and a career impacts women doctors, their families, their practice and, ultimately, their ability to sustain a career in medicine.
“We want to initiate a national conversation on fertility, family planning, pregnancy, and motherhood among women doctors, and its relationship to doctor wellbeing, recruitment and retention.
“So far, the findings show that the path to motherhood is not always straightforward for women doctors. Crucial insights have emerged into some of the key issues that will need to be addressed – for example better supporting those experiencing infertility, ensuring that training in any specialty is possible for women doctors with family commitments, and removing the challenges around arranging and enjoying maternity leave. Our understanding on the specific changes needed will develop as the study continues.
“Identifying and removing barriers will be vital for women doctors, but also in retaining passionate and skilled doctors in Irish health service. We must do all we can to ensure medicine remains an attractive and viable career path for all.
Professor Gozie Offiah, Chair of the MPS Foundation, which supported the study, added: “Gaining a deeper understanding of the complexity of motherhood for women doctors and how they can be better supported, is long overdue.
“Addressing the issues that have emerged will be critical in the context of our ongoing recruitment and retention crisis, and particularly as women now make up 47% of the medical workforce. It is a challenge the profession can no longer afford to overlook.”
The MPS Foundation - part of the Medical Protection Society - invests in research, analysis, education and training which enables medical and dental practitioners around the world to provide better care for their patients and improve their own wellbeing. It has supported more than 60 medical and dental research projects worldwide.
END
For further information contact [email protected]
To learn more about the MAM project visit here and to view the policy paper here.
Key points from the MAM paper:
- As the Irish population grows, doctor shortages increase, and more women join the medical workforce, it is more critical to understand the challenges women doctors face. More detail on the specific barriers to motherhood, and its pursuit, experienced by women doctors in the ROI will be crucial to improving the experiences of women doctors. The MAM project will produce this understanding through the analysis of over 3800 survey comments, and 55 interviews completed with doctor-mothers.
- There is a need to consider supports for women doctors experiencing infertility. Fertility treatments may be difficult to navigate with work responsibilities. Better understanding the experiences of women doctors, and introducing supports, should be priorities.
- Sustaining the medical workforce will require targeted actions to address the unique challenges of different specialties. This includes making surgery and hospital-based specialties more ‘family friendly’ and addressing challenges in general practice such as securing cover for leave and income loss experienced during maternity leave.
- Improving policy and practices around maternity leave is essential. Appropriate scheduling, coverage, and staffing can reduce guilt, ease pressure on colleagues, and support women doctors in taking their desired duration of leave. Formalising leave arrangements and policies across the health service and training schemes is also needed.
- Improve breastfeeding experiences. Women doctors have high breastfeeding rates. Learning from them could support improving breastfeeding rates in the ROI. Understanding work-related barriers to breastfeeding could improve satisfaction with duration of breastfeeding among women doctors.
Dr Sinéad Lydon is a behavioural psychologist, an Associate Professor in Primary Care within University of Galway’s Department of General Practice, and mother of two young children.
Ms Sanjana Biju is a PhD candidate and researcher at University of Galway.
The MPS Foundation invests in research, analysis, education and training which enables medical and dental practitioners around the world to provide better care for their patients and improve their own wellbeing. The MPS Foundation is part of Medical Protection Society Limited (MPS), the world’s leading protection organisation for doctors, dentists and healthcare professionals with 130 years of global healthcare experience and expertise supporting more than 350,000 doctors, dentists, and healthcare professionals worldwide.