A new study shows that female doctors are better than male doctors, but get less pay. Researchers looked at over three million medical records for hospitalizations and for readmissions (people who had to stay in hospital a second time). The percentages of readmissions and mortality (deaths) were lower if the doctor was female. Mortality rates were 15.02 per cent and readmission rates were 11.07 per cent for female doctors, compared with 15.57 per cent mortality and 11.49 per cent readmission rates for patients of male doctors.
The researchers did not say why women gave better care to patients than men. Researcher Dr. Ashish Jha said many lives could be saved in the USA every year if male doctors did as well as female doctors. He said: "We estimate that approximately 32,000 fewer patients would die if male physicians [got] the same [results] as female physicians." He also said it was wrong that men got paid more than women, because women were better at their jobs. Dr Jha added, "We need to understand why these differences exist…and figure out how to translate it" to cover all doctors.
