WOMEDS
(Women in Medicine in Spain)


Gender inequity
in the medical profession


Female representation
in medicine societies


Glass ceiling
in medical research and teaching

FEMALE LEADERSHIP
IN SPANISH
MEDICINE

Gender indicators to monitor the glass ceiling in Medicine

The WOMEDS (Women in Medicine in Spain) project is an observatory designed to monitor the representation of Spanish women physicians in leadership positions and its evolution over time, in four complementary areas: clinical care work, research, professional representation and academic career.
The purpose of this project is to identify possible gender gaps in each area and propose actions to promote equal opportunities to career development contributing to the fight against inequalities faced by women physician in Spain.
The first results, compelling data from 2019 to 2021, established the first indicators. Standardised data have been provided on the representativeness of women as global data and also itemised by specialities and Autonomous Communities.
The observatory will be updated on an annual basis to monitor changes in tackling the gender gap in female leadership as well as to check whether the desired effect of the corrective actions has been produced.

Meet the team behind the Womeds project.

The annual observatory of female leadership in Spanish medicine is a Spanish Federation of Medicals Societies (Federación de Asociaciones Científico Médicas Españolas (FACME)) project developed by a group of women with extensive experience in healthcare, especially in the field of medical societies and universities.

These professionals are committed to investigating the gender gap in leadership positions for women in medicine and working to reduce it.

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News

The scientific journal “Human Resources for Health” publishes the WOMEDS study on gender inequality in the medical profession

14 de October de 2023

After broadcasting the first data obtained to the media, a scientific study was prepared and published by the magazine “BMC Human Resources for Health”. Abstract Background The […]

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Doctors Cristina Avendaño and Pilar Garrido from FACME: “There is less visibility of women scientists and this requires an additional effort to give us that first opportunity”

13 de February de 2023
On the occasion of World Day of Women and Girls in Science, the Illustrious Official College of Physicians of Madrid interviews doctors Cristina Avendaño, vice president of [...]
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Women in Medicine: Are career development opportunities the same?

19 de January de 2023

According to the National Institute of Statistics, there were 283,811 licensed physicians in Spain in 2021: 149,984 women (52.8%) and 133,827 men (47.2%). The predominance of women […]

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Female leadership in the Spanish National Health Care system

We made visible the representation of women physicians in leadership positions in the National Health System. To do this, we calculate the ratio between the proportion of women in leadership positions and the proportion of women in the group analyzed. These data are also broken down by medical speciality and autonomous community when this information is available.
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Female leadership in scientific-professional representation

We have collected data and considered the number of women who hold positions of responsibility on the boards of directors of medical societies, official medical associations and medical academies, in relation to the proportion of women in the group. We also collected information provided by the medical societies on the invitations of speakers to participate in the national congresses of each speciality.
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Female leadership at universities

The level of female representation in academic careers is evaluated by analysing the ratio between female doctors in leadership academic positions and total female physician teaching in medical schools.
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Female leadership in medical research

The Carlos III Health Research Institute (Instituto de Salud Carlos III (ISCIII)), the largest Spanish public funding entity in biomedical research, provided data on application and granting rates split by gender related to different projects calls. We calculated the women ratio in leadership positions similarly to the other settings.
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