The lack of diversity among medical leadership gap is well-described. Men, white physicians, and white men physicians are overrepresented in leadership, academic, and decision-making roles relative to their proportion in medicine. This is best highlighted in specialties that are predominantly women, like pediatrics and obstetrics, where most of leaders are still men. This gap is […]
Latest articles
From a place of hope by Nagina Khan
I am absolutely delighted to write this blog for International Women’s Day 2022. As a woman in medical education and medical research, my own journey has been embedded in the NHS and academic departments which work to inform health and policy globally. I want to start by highlighting a quote by Secretary-General of the United […]
Women Speakers in Healthcare: Still Speaking Up for Balanced Gender Representation by Rose Penfold
Who are Women Speakers in Healthcare? Women Speakers in Healthcare (WSH) is a grassroots database organisation, co-founded by five NHS women in 2019. We were brought together by a shared frustration that women remain underrepresented on panels and as speakers at healthcare conferences and events, despite comprising the majority of the health and social care […]
‘I am woman, hear me roar’ by Emma Hadley
I have been very fortunate to grow up in a world surrounded by incredible women. Whether it has been family members, friends, through my education, or my working world, I have never been short of women role-models to provide tangible guidance, inspiration and hope for my own future. As a child, these women helped cultivate […]
What makes an old riddle a riddle? by Amira Tankel
‘A father and son are in a horrible car crash that kills the dad. The son is rushed to the hospital; just as he’s about to go under the knife, the surgeon says, “I can’t operate – that boy is my son!”’.1 How is this possible? If you didn’t guess that the surgeon could have […]
A work-life balance is possible by Fathima Rawther
A BMJ paper in 2016 investigating the work-life balance of doctors in training in the UK, showed that the lack of work-life balance in postgraduate medical training negatively impacted on trainees learning, particularly women with children. I believe the situation now is not much different, if not worsened by the COVID pandemic. I am currently […]
Being a leader of change – How youth voice can amplify and influence decision making by Aishah Farooq
Today marks International Women’s Day. A day to celebrate the achievements, accomplishments, and journeys of every women across all professions. Having your voice heard, as a young person, can be a challenging and a despairing situation to be in – initially my opinions often felt like white noise, non-existent and tokenistic. However, it was such […]
From presumptive exclusion towards fair inclusion – the importance of the meaningful involvement of women in research by Rageshri Dhairyawan and Angelina Namiba
We recently co-authored an academic paper as part of a special collection on HIV and women’s health. This summarised the historic exclusion of women in HIV research and methods to address this, from the perspectives of community, medical, and advocacy stakeholders. Importantly, several authors were women living with HIV and the special collection it was […]
Leadership and Gender Pay Gaps in Medicine by Jane Dacre
Why am I interested in women in leadership? Well, I grew up with three brothers, and no sisters. From an early age, it was clear to me that boys were allowed privileges that were not open to girls, and that the societal expectations on me were different from those on my brothers. I was encouraged […]
Breaking the bias: Celebrating International Women’s Day by By Helen Bevan, NHS Horizons team, England and Prerana Issar, former Chief People Officer of the NHS in England, in a personal capacity
International Women’s Day, 8th March 2022, is an opportunity to celebrate the role that women play at work and in the world. In healthcare systems around the world, women make up around 80% of the workforce. Women are doing 80% of the work, but not 80% of the decision making: women are not represented in […]