The health of female physicians in Hungary. A longitudinal perspective

Abstract

There is a worldwide rising tendency of women who decide to become physician. One of the most remarkable fields of investigation is the well-being of female doctors. To study the prevalence of somatic and reproductive morbidity in a representative sample of Hungarian female physicians and compare it with a control group of graduated women. Data for this epidemiological study were collected from 2515 female physicians in 2013. Graduated women from a representative survey (Hungarostudy 2013) served as controls. The results were compared to the previous (2003-2004) representative female physicians' survey. We found that the prevalence of chronic somatic morbidity among female physicians was significantly higher than that in the respective control groups. A larger proportion of female medical doctors were characterized by time-to-pregnancy interval longer than one year, and undergoing infertility therapy and miscarriages, compared to the control female population, while the same prevalence of terminations of pregnancy was found. The longitudinal perspective confirmed the existence of the "Hungarian female physicians' paradox".