Working hours of male doctors have dropped sharply, data shows. Why?
Global News
The working hours of male physicians in Canada have sharply declined over the past 30 years, a new study says, amid increased burnout and health-care staffing challenges.
The working hours of male physicians in Canada have sharply declined over the past three decades, a new study says, amid increased burnout and ongoing health-care staffing challenges in the country.
The research published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) Monday showed that doctors continue to work longer hours than the rest of the labour force in Canada, but the working hours of family physicians and specialists have dipped between 1987 and 2021. Surprisingly, the shift among men was more noticeable.
“Often, it’s hypothesized that the feminization of the physician workforce, more and more females in medicine, who tend to work few hours due to various responsibilities outside of work, may be a cause of declining hours, but we found mostly with males and married males whose hours declined over that two-, three-decade period of time,” said Boris Kralj, lead study author and an adjunct professor in the department of economics at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont.
Overall, both male and female physicians worked on average nearly seven fewer hours per week from 2017 to 2021 than they did from 1987 to 1991, representing a 13 per cent decline.
From working 55.2 hours per week on average to 47.7, male doctors worked 7.5 hours less over this time period, which is a 13.6 per cent decrease.
However, the working hours for female doctors who have doubled in proportion in the health-care workforce have remained relatively stable over the same time period at roughly 45 hours per week, the study said.
Researchers at McMaster University analyzed Statistic Canada’s labour force survey data from 1987 to 2021.
They also found that married physicians are working considerably fewer hours than they did 30 years ago — from 53.1 on average weekly in the 1987-1991 time period to 45.7 on average weekly in 2017-2021 — a 14 per cent decrease.
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