Married women doctors' training and re-employment schemes in the West Midlands Region, with particular reference to psychiatry.

Abstract

The response of one region to the Department of Health and Social Security recommendations on re-employment of women doctors contained in H.M. 69(6) is described. In many specialities there has been an encouraging return of married women doctors to medical practice within the hospital service. In the field of psychiatry the experience in a local sub-regional training scheme suggests that graduates of a high calibre can be attracted back to this speciality on a part-time basis for training; the training has been acceptable for full qualification and the examination success rate is high; part-time appointments, including senior registrar and consultant posts, can be obtained; it would not appear that training need, in the first instance, be confined to those people working in a main teaching centre; the satisfactory resolution of any conflict between trainees' domestic and professional commitments is important, as is a flexible approach to the individual professional needs of the trainees. Such schemes appear to tap a valuable source of potential manpower which higherto has not been fully utilized.