Do female doctors boost odds of survival?

Patients have a small but “significant” boost to their survival rates if their doctor is female, a new study says.

Researchers at the University of California Los Angeles combed through insurance claims data for 485,100 female patients and 318,800 males. They determined how many patients died or were readmitted within 30 days of seeing a doctor.

For both male and female genders, “patients have lower mortality and re-admission rates when treated by female physicians,” the study found.

Results showed that while 8.15 per cent of female patients died when treated by a female doctor, the mortality rate when seeing a male doctor was a “clinically significant” 8.38 per cent. While the difference may seem small, out of every 1,000 patients, two more survived if being treated by a female doctor.

Female patients who saw female doctors were also less likely to be readmitted, 15.23 per cent compared to 16.71 per cent. This may be due to female doctors being better able to communicate with female patients, according to the study.

“The benefit of receiving treatments from female physicians is larger for female patients than for male patients,” the study said, but the difference in death rates was still present in males.

Males with female physicians had a 10.15 per cent mortality rate compared to a male doctor’s 10.23 per cent. That’s one fewer death per 1,000 patients.

In Canada, 49.7 per cent of family doctors and 40.2 per cent of specialist doctors were female, according to 2022 figures from the Canadian Institute of Health Information.

Male and female physicians “practise medicine differently, and these differences have a meaningful impact on patients’ health outcomes,” researcher Yusuke Tsugawa said in a statement.

“Further research on the underlying mechanisms linking physician gender with patient outcomes, and why the benefit of receiving the treatment from female physicians is larger for female patients, has the potential to improve patient outcomes across the board,” he added.

The full study is published in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

GINTS IVUSKANS / AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES A statue of a doctor stands outside the National Museum of Arts in Riga, Latvia. A new study finds lower mortality rates among patients treated by female physicians.