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. 2022 Nov;22(6):584-585.
doi: 10.7861/clinmed.2022-0360.

Sexism in a UK-wide medical examination

Sarah E Fox  1 , Ben Paxton  2
Affiliations

Sexism in a UK-wide medical examination

Sarah E Fox et al. Clin Med (Lond). 2022 Nov.

Abstract

Gender bias and sexism in the health profession in the UK has been highlighted as a major problem. Efforts to reduce this must include medical training and examinations. The Situational Judgment Test (SJT) is an examination that must be passed to work as a foundation doctor in the UK; and is taken by all UK medical students. We analysed gender balance in all 215 scenarios included in the official practice papers for the SJT. We found that senior doctors were more than twice as likely to be men than women, while there was no significant gender difference in representation of foundation year-1 doctors, other health professionals or patients/relatives. This inequality has the potential to reinforce gender biases in healthcare. Medical examinations can, instead, represent an opportunity for prejudices to be challenged.

Keywords: gender inequality; medical education; medical examinations.

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Figures

Fig 1.
Fig 1.
Genders of the roles from all scenarios described in the three official Situational Judgment Test practice papers compared with UK final-year medical students’ genders taking the Situational Judgment Test.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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    1. UK Foundation Programme . Practice SJT papers. UK Foundation Programme. https://foundationprogramme.nhs.uk/situational-judgement-test-sjt/practi... [Accessed 04 March 2022].