The American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons has begun a new campaign to entice women to enter a career in orthopaedic surgery. Dr. David Bonaparte, diversity coordinator for the AAOS, believes the new campaign will succeed where others have failed. “Our initial efforts were to highlight what draws most of us into the field; working with power tools, a work-life balance that allows for time lifting at the gym, and easily attracting the opposite sex.”
Orthopaedics has only 6% women, currently the lowest of any specialty. “When we noticed that urology was attracting more women than ortho, we realized that we had to change our approach,” said Bonaparte. “We had difficulty understanding why women would rather operate on the penis than on bone. That’s when it occurred to us that our recruitment efforts had to address what is important to women.”
As per Bonaparte, “Women in medicine are often juggling families and a career. Their time is extremely valuable. What sets orthopaedics apart, are conferences where there is no wait for the women’s restroom.”
In a recent study by Faker et al, the average wait time for the bathroom at the American Academy of Pediatrics annual meeting is 10 minutes for women and 1 minute for men. Ob/gyn fared the worst, with a 17 minute wait for women and no wait at all for the men. Orthopaedic surgery was the only specialty where women didn’t have to wait for the bathroom at all.
The campaign by the AAOS is set to launch next month, and will feature selfies of women in empty bathrooms with the hashtag #nopeepeedanceforortho.
