The Rural/Urban Practice Location Patterns of Women Medical School Graduates
While women are becoming an increasingly large percentage of the graduates of medical schools and of the generalist specialties in particular, they are much less likely to locate their practices in rural towns. If this trend were to persist, implications for access to care in rural areas would be substantial. This study involved a survey including questions about where the residents preferred to locate and how much they thought they would be practicing in the future. They study first examined national physician location patterns by medical school graduation cohort per gender differences. The second phase dealt with the production of female generalist physicians by medical schools. 1996 AMA data were examined.
Publications
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U.S. Medical Schools and the Rural Family Physician Gender Gap
Author(s): Kathleen E. Ellsbury, Mark P. Doescher, L. Gary Hart
Citation: Fam Med. May 2000;32(5):331-337
Date: 05 / 2000
Background: Women comprise increasing proportions of medical school graduates. They tend to choose primary care but are less likely than men to choose rural practice.
Methods: This study used American Medical Association masterfile data on 1988-1996 medical school graduates to identify the US medical schools most successful at producing rural family physicians and general practitioners of both genders.
Results: The number of listed rural female family physician or general practitioner graduates among schools ranged from 0-27 (0% to 4.4% of each school's 1988-1996 graduates). There were approximately twice as many male as female rural family physicians and general practitioners. Publicly funded schools produced more rural female family physicians and general practitioners than their privately funded counterparts.
Conclusions: Our findings suggest that a few schools, most of them public, may serve as models for schools that aim to train women who later enter rural practice.
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