OB/GYN clinicians, trainees report sexual harassment, discrimination, bullying
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Key takeaways:
- Sexual harassment, workplace discrimination and bullying were frequently reported among OB/GYN clinicians and trainees.
- No studied interventions significantly decreased sexual harassment frequency.
Within obstetrics and gynecology, sexual harassment, workplace discrimination and bullying were frequently reported among clinicians and trainees, according to a systematic review published in JAMA Network Open.
“Equity in the workplace and in life is a fundamental tenet of a just society. Every person should be free from harassment, abuse and discrimination. Our organizations devoted to women’s health care strive for that common goal,” Jubilee Brown, MD, professor and division director of gynecologic oncology at the Levine Cancer Institute and Hall Gynecologic Oncology Center and member of the Women in Oncology Peer Perspective Board, told Healio. “Leadership from these organizations united to develop common standards for conduct, and in discussions we recognized that we needed to define the prevalence of sexual harassment, bullying, abuse and discrimination among obstetricians and gynecologists and interventions related to reducing harassment.”
Gupta and colleagues searched PubMed, Embase and ClinicalTrials.gov from inception to June 2023 and identified 22 studies addressing the prevalence of sexual harassment, bullying, abuse and discrimination among OB/GYNs and trainees and interventions to reduce harassment in obstetrics and gynecology and other surgical specialties.
Overall, researchers identified 10 studies addressing harassment prevalence among 5,852 participants and 12 studies addressing interventions among 2,906 participants. For prevalence, researchers surveyed personal harassment experiences by other health care personnel, event reporting, burnout and exit from medicine, fear of retaliation and related outcomes among OB/GYN clinicians and trainees in the U.S. and Canada. For interventions, researchers evaluated interventions across all surgical specialties to decrease harassment incidence.
Among OB/GYN respondents, sexual harassment (27.6% to 70.9%), workplace discrimination (57%) and bullying (52.8%) were common. The prevalence of workplace discrimination was 67.2% for women and 38.5% for men. OB/GYN trainees commonly reported experiencing sexual harassment (69.1%), including gender harassment, unwanted sexual attention and sexual coercion. About one-quarter (25.1%) of medical students reported experiencing mistreatment, including verbal abuse, coercion or negative consequences, during their OB/GYN rotation.
A greater proportion of OB/GYN trainees (32.6%) reported their sexual harassment to colleagues, supervisors or other responsible parties compared with American Association of Gynecologic Laparoscopist members (8.4%) and gynecologic oncologists ( 12.5%). In addition, in gynecologic surgery, gender discrimination was the most common form of discrimination for men (72.3%) and women (90.1%).
Harassers included physicians (30.1%), other trainees (13.1%), patients (8.2%) and operating room staff (7.7%).
“Sadly, these findings are not surprising to me,” Brown said. “Through my own lived experience and through discussion with colleagues, it is evident from a personal perspective that sexual harassment and discrimination are endemic.”
Interventions to reduce harassment were associated with improved recognition of bias and reporting. Implementing a video- and discussion-based mistreatment program during surgery clerkship was tied to a decrease in mistreatment reports from 14 to nine reports in the first year and four reports in the second year.
No interventions resulted in significant decreases in sexual harassment frequency, according to the researchers.
According to Brown, the medical community must prohibit these behaviors to protect students, trainees and colleagues and provide safe environments for everyone to thrive.
“Harassment, discrimination and abuse are absolutely unacceptable in any form. As professionals, leaders and professional societies, we must adopt a zero-tolerance policy toward these prohibited behaviors,” Brown said. “Education and implicit bias training are essential first steps, and additional outcomes data need to be published on the impact of these interventions.”
For more information:
Jubilee Brown, MD, can be reached at Jubilee.Brown@atriumhealth.org.