#WhatADoctorLooksLike
I am a 37-year-old Woman in Medicine, with many experiences to share.
Some of my stories might seem familiar to you. Each one has been a valuable learning experience. These memories, etched in my mind, were previously disconcerting. I have come to realize the power and potential they carry.
Now, these stories are my narrative, part of the collective narrative of women in medicine. The very means by which we can raise awareness and make Gender Parity a reality. Even if that process is painfully slow.
Starting Out.
I was 25 when I started Internal Medicine Residency in the United States. I was born and raised in Delhi and went to Medical School in Chennai, India. I was still getting used to being asked if I was old enough to be a doctor and when was it that I learned English!
At 31, I landed my first “real job” as a Critical Care Medicine Attending. It was best not to bring up my age, since many of my trainees were older than me, I realized. More importantly, patients and consultants, sometimes viewed me suspiciously. It seemed it was because I was so young, and a “foreigner” with an accent, said the nurses.
I was mistaken for a nurse often. I assumed it was because I was the youngest attending/consultant around. I soon learned, that besides age, race and origin, there was yet another bias I was still waking up to; Gender Disparity.
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A Few Months In.
A few months into my first job, a senior male physician thrust his patient list into my hands, telling me is going home early for a holiday event. What was that, I asked. A religious festival that he needs to be home for, he mentioned, walking away in haste.
He had just asked me to do his work, without the courtesy of a request, prior conversation or arrangement.
I clutched the list in disbelief, my feet still glued to the spot we had this encounter.
“You are not a resident anymore!” barked my 36-year-old, female colleague, as she walked up to me. “Please read the book Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. There is so much you will have to navigate as a woman physician”.
Wait, what?! Being a “Woman Physician” was an issue? Most of my aunties are doctors. Being a woman and a physician isn’t a novelty, I thought. Besides wasn’t “feminism” a thing from my mother generation, along with Gloria Steinem? Wasn’t gender disparity a concern in this day and age, only in certain parts of the world faced with socioeconomic challenges and cultural taboos?
I was sorely mistaken, I was soon to learn.
Wait, what?! Being a “Woman Physician” was an issue? Most of my aunties are doctors. Being a woman and a physician isn’t a novelty, I thought.
My Family.
My great grandaunt, Muthulakshmi Reddy, was among India’s first women physicians. The first woman member of the Madras state legislative council, she mooted the Devadasi Abolition Act that abolished the practice of pre-puberty girls being married off to a deity to live by dancing and singing and founded the first cancer hospital in India.
An inspiration for both genders, she worked tirelessly for women’s rights in India.
I was surrounded by doctors who were women in India. They still assumed most of the household responsibilities, which is something that I hoped my generation would change. Historically, it has not even been 200 years, since women entered the field of Medicine. I suppose we are playing “catch up”. But for how long?
Shouldn’t we get the benefit of doubt given this huge disparity in privilege?
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Quoting Celebrity.
I love this quote by Mindy Kaling, TV actor and producer:
“I am so confident because my parents raised me as an entitled white male”
Ditto. I feel the same way, given my privilege, although I wouldn’t have known what an “entitled white male” meant back in Medical School! Working in the United States has of course, made me fully aware of this uncomfortable truth.
My mom used to joke how I was ‘like a boy” – far from gentle and graceful. She is one of the most liberal people I know.
My father is my best friend, always encouraging and reminding me of my abilities. The best person to call when I needed much needed boost of confidence.
I was assured I could be and do anything I wanted to.
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Starting Later.
I started Medical School at the ripe age of 17.
We had 75 girls and 75 boys in my class. I graduated when I was 23 and after two years of taking tests in order to become ECFMG certified, going to interviews, it was time for the Match. Grateful to land a residency, even though New York was my first choice, I started my Internal Medicine Residency, a proud PGY 1, at the age of 25 in St. Louis, Missouri.
As an Intern doing ward rounds, I looked at my list and saw my next patient was a 94-year-old Caucasian Male with pneumonia.
Identifying patients by race, a novelty for me. Was it to help narrow down disease processes? Doesn’t it somehow stereotype individuals? I wondered if I was supposed to say “Hello, I am Sonali Mantoo, a 25-year-old Indian, your doctor”!
Oh well, I was still an intern. I had so much to learn!
I walked in through the door, nervous with my list and clipboard and greeted the elderly gentleman cheerfully. In response, my patient who was a war veteran scowled, and said:
“Whatever happened to all the good ‘old White American Boy Doctors”?
Dumbstruck, I started to giggle.
To my relief, in walked a black African American nurse & we both had a good laugh. We told him we were all he had!
He resorted to muttering under his breath and begrudgingly accepted his medication from the nurse, as I waited patiently to examine him.
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Laughter.
Laughter has been my first response to racism when I personally encounter it. Probably as a helpless coping mechanism!
I am truly at a loss for words when confronted with this sort of bias.
Didn’t educated humans know that Homo Sapiens originated from Africa, before Pangea split into the various continents as we know them today? Or that our livers, hearts and lungs are not colored any different? Bias based on the color of skin, seemed like the most ignorant of all biases to me.
Yet it is painfully present, leading to the all sorts of stereotypes and assumptions.
Gender Bias is a whole other beast, I came to realize.
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Bias in Action.
I did my Critical Care fellowship at a large University hospital in New York City, known to admit the rich and the famous.
One day, during sign-out in the Neuro-Critical Care Unit, I noticed the name of a certain patient and asked my colleague if this was the same as the fashion designers? He said yes; he was one of our “stable ICU patients”, likely ready for transfer to the wards the next day.
As I knocked on his door getting ready to introduce myself, our famous fashion designer patient said: “Get me a bedpan”, brushing me away, while on a phone call.
Startled, I said “Yes, of course” and asked the nurse where to find the bedpan.
After I gave him the bedpan, I told him after he was done, I would need to come back in, as the physician on call in order to examine him. He looked surprised and told me to wait.
Initially irate, I went about my business. This was not a patient I was going to chat with or go the extra mile to make him feel comfortable. He was a middle-aged White Male. It didn’t matter that he was educated and lived in New York City.
I was reminded that even in the 21st century, bias was real. Whether it was my race or my gender or my age, or maybe all of them, I will never know. It was his tone and assumption, not his request, that irked me.
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More Bias.
While on an Emirates flight, I responded to the dreaded call for “Is there a Doctor on board”.
I was fervently hoping it wasn’t a cardiac arrest or stroke. As an ICU physician, I naturally think of the worst possible scenarios! I walked towards the lady in distress surrounded by airline crew and felt relieved she was awake and communicative.
A middle-aged man, presumably a doctor, came down from the business class section, enquiring about the situation at hand. He introduced himself as an ENT surgeon and before I could introduce myself, he asked me if I was a nurse. The “patient” was nauseous and needed an injection that she carried with her. I responded I was a Critical Care physician, while dressed in yoga pants and neon colored headband. While he continued gaping at me, I handed him the syringe and told him I am sure he was more qualified to perform procedures and left.
Satisfied with my response, I settled back into my humble economy seat, smiling as I resumed watching my movie I had abruptly left.
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Seriously, Isn’t It Already 2018?
Seriously, isn’t it already 2018?
I had equal number of girls and boys in my Medical School Classroom way back in 1998. Then why is it that people gawk when a woman says she is a physician!
This is exactly why I am thrilled to be part of any person, event or group that works towards Gender Parity. I intend to leave the world a better place than I found it.
All the women who came before me made it easier for me to walk this path. If I woke up to the reality that is gender bias only in my thirties, I better get to work, if I want the future generations to walk into a more equal workplace.
After all, isn’t Medicine about helping people? While we improve our patients lives, let us work on helping ourselves as well.
I was reminded that even in the 21st century, bias was real. Whether it was my race or my gender or my age, or maybe all of them, I will never know. It was his tone and assumption, not his request, that irked me.
