Flexibility and Mentoring Key to Boosting the Ranks of Women in Cardiology.

Abstract

When Laura J. Collins, MD, a cardiologist at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, presented at her first scientific meeting she was blown away, “Where are the women?” she recalled thinking at the time. When she interviewed for her first job, she’d never met a woman cardiologist. Now, she works in a cardiology program that takes pride in having many female faculty members. Although much has changed for young women entering the field of cardiology, there remains a significant disparity between the number of women and men in the field. A 2015 survey of >2000 cardiologists presented by Sandra Lewis, MD, a cardiologist at Northwest Cardiovascular Institute, at the 2016 American College of Cardiology Annual Scientific Session found that <1 in 5 cardiologists is a woman. By contrast, women make up about half of medical school graduates and internal medicine specialists. Women cardiologists are also more likely to be single than their male counterparts (15% versus 5%) and less likely to have children (72% versus 86%), Lewis found. “We need to understand the barriers to women entering cardiology and work toward breaking down those barriers,” said Lewis in a statement. A variety of factors have been identified as potentially deterring women from entering cardiology, including extended training and potential radiation exposure during prime childbearing years, high debt loads, a demanding lifestyle, lower pay for women cardiologists, and a culture that may be unwelcoming. “It’s not just one thing, its multiple things together,” Collins said. But efforts to …