The Attitude and Perceptions of Work–Life Balance: A Comparison Among Women Surgeons in Japan, USA, and Hong Kong China

Abstract

Being a Swedish female surgeon should be a walk in the park, right? One of the most egalitarian countries in the world, where glossy magazines feature stories about stayat-home daddies pushing prams while drinking cafe lattes with their buddies. We have paid parental leave for 480 days, where 2 months are reserved for each parent. Day care is subsidized by the state and accessible for all. Women are even more educated than men, and most women return to their previous job when the children start day care, and this right is protected by law. Although Sweden might seem like heaven on earth for an egalitarian, the truth is that according to Statistics Sweden (Statistiska Centralbyran) 64 % of all the cooking, cleaning, and washing up in the home is carried out by the women, 76 % of the parental leave is taken by women, and women have only 82 % of the income of men. In medical school the female students are now outnumbering the men, even if by just a few points over 50 %. Some of the medical specialities have even become predominantly female, like gynecology, geriatrics, general practice, and pediatrics. Other specialities have only slowly changed toward a more equal distribution between the sexes, and a few seem to be very hard for women to get into. Those are mainly surgical specialities like neurosurgery, thoracic surgery, vascular surgery, and orthopedic surgery. In general surgery, women now make up about 20 % of the consultant surgeons. Among the surgeons in training, the number is around 40 %. Surgeons work on average no more than 45 h per week. The working hours are strictly regulated by law. So even though the situation in Sweden may seem very different from that in Hong Kong, Japan, or the United States, the three countries represented in this article by Kawase et al., there are issues linking the experience of female surgeons around the world. Some of those issues seem to be more about being a woman than about being a surgeon. I have read this scientific article like it is a diary of my life. I recognize almost every quote and every explanation. These are my female colleagues’ experiences, and mine as well, although to a lesser degree. These choices have been and are being made by me and my surgical sisters, all the time. This is so because the surgical profession may be one of the last remaining bastions of male hierarchy, and it serves as a magnifying glass for structures hidden or diluted in the rest of the society. Women in surgery is quite a new occurrence, and the old ideals are still in place, waiting to be ousted. I have yet to see a female surgical boss! (Here I have to include something about my male colleagues of the last 10 years: each and every one of them has taken parental leave for at least 3 months with every child born to him. Hurray for them!) This article about the surgeons in Japan, Hong Kong, and the United States, can be divided into two principal parts: