The next time you ask me about your latest and greatest seemingly unknown medical fact that you spent 3 hours the night before researching, how about asking me about the suicide rates for physicians vs. the general public?
The next time you ask me about your latest and greatest seemingly unknown medical fact that you spent 3 hours the night before researching, how about asking me about the suicide rates for physicians vs. the general public?
It’s interesting that the ratio of women is higher than men. -Ben
I’d venture to guess that the ratio is higher for women then men for quite a few reasons:
1. Many women have a lower threshold for verbal abuse and other abuses that occur in the medical profession then men. That’s a fact as old as the existence of men and women. Men and women handle the stresses and rigor differently and often times women are more sensitive to emotional issues then men.
2. Women are usually the ones who will be giving childbirth one day if they plan on having a family. Subsequently, they’ll be the one who’ll be doing most of the raising of the kids unless they find a husband who’s willing to take a lower position job wise and/or agree to be the stay at home parent. Traditionally speaking, most men are not for the idea of being lesser financially and professionally then women which brings me to point number 3.
3. A lot of women who end up educated at a higher professional level find it hard to find a husband especially in more traditional non North American/English cultures. In cultures like Indian culture, latino culture, Italian and Greek cultures, etc. etc. where values are placed high on the traditional role of women as nuturers and caregivers and men as the educated providers bring in the bread and butter, there is a reluctance for men to look at people who may be extremely highly educated. As an example, a few family friends of mine have daughters in fields like optometry, dentistry, and medicine. our culture is one in which arranged marriage or semi-arranged marriage often occurs and when looking for suitable guys a lot of the guys have often told these same professionals that they should quit their job because the guy is also in medicine or a higher field so the woman, according to them, should not have to work.
In fact, many of these same men have tried to tell these same girls that they’ll only marry them if they quit their jobs. I believe one of my family friends discouraged their daughter from going into a higher field for this particular reason and several other parents don’t want their female children going into high paying fields for similar reasons. If that’s the case, then loneliness could be another factor contributing to women who end up doing such.
Nice comment guju. I’m sure that cultural differences play a pretty big role in the differences between men and women. I agree with that women deal with stress and verbal abuse much differently than men do…I saw this a lot during my medical school years. In particular, I remember seeing girls cry on multiple occasions after getting verbally beat down.