For all of the avid readers of my blog, as well as my mother, you'll recall that I have been working on my doctoral dissertation over the past three years. I am pleased, and relieved, to say that I successfully defended my dissertation on March 13, The Graduate School officially accepted the final copies of my paper, and I will graduate with a Ph.D. in Higher Education Administration from Loyola University Chicago on May 8, 2008.
Beyond this embarrassing self-congratulations, I also wanted to share a few highlights from my dissertation. My study is entitled, "Female Osteopathic Medical Students: When the Minority Becomes the Majority." In 2003, women became the majority of first-year students at osteopathic medical schools nationwide, and they have been hovering at 50% levels since then. All of the data with regard to gender mix of undergraduate students, women seeking first-professional degrees at rates significantly higher than men, and women being the majority of biology majors suggests that this trend will continue. Women are predicted to become the majority of practicing physicians sometime between 2030 and 2050.
To analyze this reality, I visited two osteopathic colleges and interviewed 20 first- and second-year students (10 men and 10 women). For the most part, the genders gave similar responses in regard to their motivations for pursuing a medical career, their role models, the challenges they face, their personal resources, and their view of the role of gender as medical students. Differences were seen with regard to their expectations for specialty choice, practice type, and full- or part-time employment. Only men were considering residencies in surgery and time-intensive primary care specialties of internal medicine and family practice. Women were veering toward female-dominant fields of OB/Gyn and pediatrics. Only two men were considering solo practice; the rest of the 18 subjects were looking at group or hospital-based practices. All of the men intended to work full-time until retirement, whereas all of the women allowed that they may have to work part-time while their children were young.
What was most significant to me was that both genders expressed that finding balance between work and life was a top priority. Many of the men were considering shiftwork, such as emergency medicine or critical care medicine, so they could spend more time with their families. Nearly all of the participants expressed that they "weren't in this for the money"; working more hours for more money wasn't something they would consider.
As one of the first cohorts of "Millennial" generation students to enter medical school, these students have much to offer the osteopathic profession. I was so impressed by their commitment to serving their patients and their dedication to becoming top physicians. By the same token, I was encouraged that they were not willing to completely "give up" their personal lives and sacrifice their family time in order to achieve success. They are going into medicine for the "right reasons," and will probably turn out to be very well-balanced and good physicians.
In many ways, I am simply happy to be "done" with my doctoral program. By the same token, I am hoping to write an article or two based on my study and try to get it published. I feel like I was able to uncover some new "truths" about this generation of medical students as well as provide some concrete information for schools, medical employers, and the osteopathic profession to consider for the future. In the meantime, I'm going to try to get used to being called "Dr. Johnson." I think it will start to grow on me pretty soon.
If you are interested, I'd be happy to send you a brief synopsis of my dissertation. Just send me an email or add a comment and I'll email it back to you. Thanks for indulging me this entry. And thanks Mom!
