Challenges Faced by Female Healthcare Professionals in the Workforce: A Scoping Review

Figures & data

Table 1 Search Strategy Including MeSH and Keywords

MeSH: Challenges	MeSH: Female	MeSH: Healthcare professionals	MeSH: Workforce
Keyword: barriers obstacles	Keyword: women gender woman	Keyword: healthcare professionals, allied health, nurs*, doctor*, physician*, paramedic*, physiotherapy*, occupational therapy*, psychiatrist, laboratories*, dentists* radiologist*	Keyword: workplace career

Note: *Truncation.

Figure 1 Flow chart of study selection.

Table 2 Studies Selected for Inclusion

No	Author/ year	Country	Discipline	Aim of the study	Study design and participants	Key outcomes	Theme
1	Sayres, M., et al.[^Citation33] (1986)	UK	Medicine	To identify possible barriers to women physicians wishing to continue with medical careers.	Mixed methods: cross-sectional questionnaire (n=63)	This study characterized the experience of pregnancy during residency at a group of Harvard-affiliated teaching hospitals and identified problems for both male and female residents that needed to be addressed. It is important that residency training programs reflect sensitivity to issues that are a natural and expected part of all our lives.	Family responsibilities
2	Barnett, R.C. & Garies, K.C.[^Citation34] (2000)	USA	Medicine	To examine two hypotheses: Higher reduced-hours job-role quality will be related to higher life satisfaction. Longer work hours will be related to lower life satisfaction.	Mixed methods (in-depth interview and survey) 104 predominantly white, female, reduced-hours physicians in dual-earner couples with children. n=31 retested after 1-3 months	Job-role quality was a significant predictor of life satisfaction, whereas the number of hours was not. In the reduced-hours, physicians experienced more rewards than concerns in their careers.	Family responsibilities
3	Farahat, F.[^Citation32] (2009)	Egypt	Medicine	To explore challenges faced by Egyptian female physicians as they pursue their careers and find different ways of coping with these challenges.	Cross-sectional study (Questionnaire that included open and closed questions) 300 Egyptian female physicians.	Challenges reported by physicians were either work or family related. Participating physicians dealt with challenges in different ways: deciding on a small family size (82.3%), recruitment of a babysitter/housekeeper (76.3%), and sharing in family income (62%).	Family responsibilities
4	Adisa, T.A., et al.[^Citation31] (2014)	Nigeria	Medicine and nursing	To investigate challenges and realities of work–family balance among Nigerian female doctors and nurses in their efforts to balance work and family obligations.	Case study (interview) (n=131 female medical workers, comprising 60 female doctors and 71 female nurses)	Multiple roles was very difficult for Nigerian female doctors and nurses. in Nigeria, the primary responsibility of Female doctors and nurses was to take care of her home and family while every other activity including her job was classified as a secondary role.	Family responsibilities
5	Lane, N. & Piercy, N.[^Citation44] (2003)	UK	Nursing	To identify organizational mindsets that militate against women’s career advancement.	Mixed methods Questionnaire (n=597) and “Three sets of 10–12 nurses were interviewed on a group basis, one group in each hospital. Also, seven nurse managers were interviewed individually at each of the three units”.	Ethic of discrimination are maintained and perpetuated unequal outcomes for women in nursing. The results suggested that to attempt radical change would be to risk severe damage to the human infrastructure of the organization and hence its ability to effectively undertake its tasks.	Workplace environment
6	Baker, S.R., et al.[^Citation56] (2006)	USA	Radiology	To determine if the trend of women choosing radiology as a career differed from that for other medical specialties, and if there were differences on the basis of the gender of program directors or geographic location.	Descriptive study (186 female radiology residents)	The percentage of women in this profession has remained remarkably constant at or slightly above 25%. Small but increasing numbers of women were found to be chairing academic radiology departments.	Workplace environment
7	Mobilos S., et al.[^Citation37] (2008)	Canada	Medicine	To examine experiences of women physicians with regard to the interplay between career and lifestyle choices and discover how women’s experiences had evolved during the previous three decades.	Phenomenological study using semi-structured interviews (12 female physicians)	Three main challenges emerged: lifestyle and career choices, family planning and career trajectory, and seeking balance. All participants described the constant struggle they experienced to balance their personal and professional lives.	Workplace environment
8	Nomura, K. & Gohchi, K.[^Citation39] (2012)	Japan	Medicine	To investigate whether experiences and perceptions of gender-based career obstacles among women in Japan were associated with their working status.	Cross-sectional survey (1,513 female physicians)	Being married and having children were significantly associated with part-time practice, indicating that domestic responsibilities still acted as strong obstacles that may discourage women physicians from working full-time.	Workplace environment
9	Nomura, K., et al.[^Citation57] (2015)	Japan	Medicine	To investigate difficulties Japanese female doctors faced in continuing professional practice.	Cross-sectional survey (359 female doctors)	Female doctors were struggled with long working hours due to a shortage of doctors in Japan. Poor working conditions with poor child support, and stereotypical views on gender roles are the main factors to reduced female doctors in Japan.	Workplace environment
10	Price, K. & Clearihan, L.[^Citation7] (2015)	Australia	Medicine	To explore female general practitioners’ (GPs’) perceptions of possible barriers to leadership and professional roles in the workforce.	Cross-sectional study (30 female general practitioners)	Lack of energy and geographic location were key barriers for the participation of female GPs. Female GPs also often lacked self-confidence to speak up. Energy limitations and lack of self-confidence restricting women’s capacity to engage in leadership roles.	Workplace environment
11	Phillips, J., et al.[^Citation41] (2016)	USA	Medicine	To explore how physicians balance their professional and personal lives.	Phenomenological study using semi-structured interviews (25 female family physicians)	Female doctors had experienced challenges in balancing the demand of work with the needs of family life. Female rural physicians faced conflict between their professional demands and family lives. Women with young children and those new to rural practice described this as stressful.	Workplace environment
12	Petek, D., et al.[^Citation11] (2016)	Slovenia	Medicine	To explore options and capabilities of women GP specialist trainees in coordinating their families and careers.	Phenomenological study using semi-structured interviews (10 female general practitioners)	Specialist experienced high levels of stress at work due to the nature of profession, weaknesses in the healthcare system, personal traits, inexperience and interpersonal relations with colleagues and superiors. An additional burden was the needs of their families and/or children, housework and other obligations.	Workplace environment
13	Pfleiderer, B., et al.[^Citation42] (2018)	European countries Italy, Germany, France, Norway, Poland, Lithuania, and Netherlands	Medicine	To increase the number of women in academic medicine who can serve as mentors, role models and ambassadors of change and institutional change is of major importance.	Narrative review	Reducing recruitment barriers for women in all areas of healthcare, improving gender planning, flexible working schedules, fostering career progression, reducing gender imbalances and strengthening gender dimensions are all factors to improve female physicians’ experience of their career.	Workplace environment
14	Meghen, K., et al.[^Citation38] (2013)	Ireland	Medicine	To capture female representation at all levels of medicine and to establish factors influencing career choice and progression.	Mixed methods study Interviews (25 female hospital specialists) Questionnaire (1,606 female specialist trainees)	Findings indicated that females who completed specialist training were wary of pursuing either flexible training or part-time work options and experienced discrimination. Balancing motherhood and work commitments was the biggest challenge faced by female doctors with children and caused some to change career pathways.	Workplace environment
15	Yamazaki, Y., et al.[^Citation48] (2011)	Japan	Medicine	To explore challenges facing Japanese physician–mothers in efforts to identify solutions for their retention.	Cross-sectional study using questionnaire approach (249 female physicians)	Challenges facing physician–mothers mainly comprised factors associated with Japanese society, family responsibilities and work environment. Japanese society, epitomized by traditional gender roles, was a powerful social barrier for female physicians who wished to continue working after they were married and had children.	Stereotyping
16	Tlaiss, H.[^Citation49] (2013)	Lebanon	Medicine and nursing	To explore barriers that hindered and enablers that fostered women’s career advancement in the healthcare sector.	Qualitative study, semi-structured, face-to-face, in-depth interviews (10 female healthcare managers)	Discriminatory cultural values, gendered social roles and expectations in Middle Eastern societies, and illustrated their role as barriers hindering women’s career advancement. Spill-over effect of societal expectations and cultural gender stereotypes into the organizational realm, resulting in widely experienced attitudinal and structural organizational barriers.	Stereotyping

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