A new study led by the University of California, San Diego has found women physicians are significantly more likely than other women to die by suicide
For their study, the authors examined data from the National Violent Death Reporting System regarding suicides among the general public in the United States from 2017 to 2021. According to their analysis, women physicians are 53 percent more likely to die by suicide than women non-physicians. This gap was even more pronounced before the COVID-19 pandemic, with women physicians having a 65 percent higher risk of suicide than other women from 2017 to 2019.
Notably, the same trend was not found among the male population. Over the same time period, male physicians were 16 percent less likely to commit suicide than men who were not physicians.
The authors uncovered several risk factors associated with physician suicides, including past histories of mental health struggles, legal issues, job problems, and drug use. However, they believe further research could identify other possible contributors, such as under-recognition of work achievements, inequitable pay and opportunities for promotion, work-life imbalance, and risk of sexual harassment.
The authors encourage national suicide prevention strategies within the medical profession to consider barriers facing doctors when seeking mental health treatment, such as long work shifts and potential repercussions to one’s medical licensure. They also urge prevention initiatives to particularly focus on doctors experiencing job problems and legal issues, as those challenges were found to significantly impact suicide risk.
The research team also included scholars from Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, Missouri and Northeastern University in Boston.