Most physicians and other faculty in large medical center experienced sexual harassment

New Rochelle, NY, November 18, 2019–A new study has shown that the majority of women (82.5%) and men (65.1%) working at an academic medical center reported at least one incident of sexual harassment by staff, students, and faculty during the previous year. Similarly, a substantial proportion of women (64.4%) and men (44.1%) who worked with patients reported experiencing sexual harassment from patients or their families within the prior year, according to the study published in Journal of Women’s Health, a peer-reviewed publication from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers. Click here to read the full-text article on the Journal of Women’s Health website through December 18, 2019.

The study is entitled “#MedToo: A Large-Scale Examination of the Incidence and Impact of Sexual Harassment of Physicians and Other Faculty at an Academic Medical Center.” It was coauthored by Emily Vargas, PhD, Sheila Brassel, Lilia Cortina, PhD, Isis Settles, PhD, timothy Johnson, MD, and Reshma Jagsi, MD, DPhil.

The researchers systematically examined the prevalence of recent sexual harassment among a large sample of physicians and other faculty currently practicing in an academic medical center. The study included multiple potential sources of harassment, including other faculty, staff, and students, as well as patients and patients’ families. In addition, the study focused on the outcomes of sexual harassment and found a negative association between sexual harassment and physician mental health, job satisfaction, sense of safety at work, and intentions to look for new employment.

In the accompanying Editorial entitled “Sexual Harassment Is an Occupational Hazard,” Sabine Oertelt-Prigione, MD, PhD, Radboud University Medical Center (Nijmegen, The Netherlands) and Universitätsmedizin (Berlin, Germany), concludes that “sexual harassment appears as a highly prevalent phenomenon, that impacts the entire workforce and has serious health and occupational consequences.” Employers have a legal duty to devote personnel and economic resources to such an impactful phenomenon, she states. “It is time to move the discourse from an individualized to an institutional level, from single cases to collective action.”

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Journal of Women’s Health, published monthly, is a core multidisciplinary journal dedicated to the diseases and conditions that hold greater risk for or are more prevalent among women, as well as diseases that present differently in women. Led by Editor-in-Chief Susan G. Kornstein, MD, Executive Director of the Virginia Commonwealth University Institute for Women’s Health, Richmond, VA, the Journal covers the latest advances and clinical applications of new diagnostic procedures and therapeutic protocols for the prevention and management of women’s healthcare issues. Complete tables of content and a sample issue may be viewed on the Journal of Women’s Health website. Journal of Women’s Health is the official journal of the Society for Women’s Health Research.

Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers is a privately held, fully integrated media company known for establishing authoritative peer-reviewed journals in many promising areas of science and biomedical research, including LGBT Health, Transgender Health, Population Health Management, and Breastfeeding Medicine. Its biotechnology trade magazine, GEN (Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News), was the first in its field and is today the industry’s most widely read publication worldwide. A complete list of the firm’s 90 journals, books, and newsmagazines is available on the Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers website.