'Heroes and fairy wrens': The changing face of rural general practice
Angela Durey
Centre for Social Research, Edith Cowan University, WA
PP: 166 - 177
Abstract
Increasing numbers of women are entering the medical workforce in western industrialised countries. Many are calling for reform in the workplace by demanding more flexible hours to better balance the demands of work and home.
This is particularly relevant in rural locations where limited childcare services are available. Ethnographic research in Western Australia with rural general practitioners examines whether greater numbers of female GPs entering medicine, and their demands for more flexibility in working hours, are altering traditional values and work practice in a rural setting.
Keywords
rural medical sociology; rural GPs; feminisation of medical workforce; flexible working hours
References
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (1999) Medical Labour Force 1997: National Health Labour Force Series, Canberra: AIHW.
Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (2003) Medical Labour Force 2001: National Health Labour Force Series No 28, Canberra: AIHW.
Australian Medical Workforce Advisory Committee (1998) Influences in Participation in the Australian Medical Workforce, Sydney: AMWAC.
Baszanger I and Dodier N (2002) Ethnography: relating the part to the whole, in D Silverman (ed) Qualitative Research: Theory, Method and Practice, London: Sage, pp.8-23.
Beagan B (2001) Neutralising differences: producing neutral doctors for (almost) neutral patients, Social Science & Medicine 51: 1253-1265.
Beeson M and Firth A (1998) Neoliberalism as a political rationality, Journal of Sociology 34(3): 215-231.
Black A, Duff J, Saggers S, Baines P, Jennings A and Bowen P (2000) Rural Communities and Rural Social Issues: Priorities for Research, Canberra: Rural Industries Research and Development Commission.
Blattel-Mink B and Kuhlman E (2003) Health professions, gender and society: introduction and outlook, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 23(4-5): 1-18.
Bryant L (1997) The voice of women in medicine, paper presented at Royal Australian College of General Practitioners Conference, Tasmania
Burns R (1997) Introduction to Research Methods 3rd edn, Melbourne: Addison Wesley Longman.
Calnan M and Williams S (1995) Challenges to professional autonomy in the United Kingdom? The perceptions of general practitioners, International Journal of Health Services 25(2): 219-241.
Carson D and Stringer K (1998) Generation and gender issues: the emerging culture within the rural and remote medical workforce: cultures in caring, paper presented at 4th Biennial Australian Rural and Remote Health Scientific Conference, Toowoomba, Queensland, August 27-28.
Crompton R and Le Feuvre N (2003) Continuity and change in the gender segregation of the medical profession in Britain and France, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 23(4): 36-58.
Davies C (1996) The sociology of professions and the profession of gender, Sociology 30(4): 661-679.
Dempsey K (1992) A Man's Town. Inequality Between Women and Men in Rural Australia, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Elston M (1993) Women doctors in a changing profession: the case of Britain, in E Riska and K Wegar (eds) Gender, Work and Medicine: Women and the Medical Division of Labour, London: Sage, pp.27-61.
Emerson R, Fretz R and Shaw L (1995) Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Eve R and Hodgkin P (1997) Professionalism and medicine, in J Broadbent, M Dietrich and J Roberts (eds) The End of the Professions? The Restructuring of Professional Work. London: Routledge, pp.69-85.
Freidson E (1970) Profession of Medicine: A Study of the Sociology of Applied Knowledge, New York: Dodd, Mead and Company.
Game A and Pringle R (1983) Gender at Work, Sydney: George, Allen & Unwin.
General Practice Strategic Policy Development Unit (2000) General Practice in Australia 2000, Canberra: Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing.
Hafferty F and Light D (1995) Professional dynamics and the changing nature of medical work, Journal of Health and Social Behaviour 36, 132-153.
Hirsch N and Fredericks C (2001) Rural doctors and retention, paper presented at 6th National Rural Health Conference, Canberra, 4-7 March.
Hochschild A (1989) The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home, New York: Viking.
Hochschild A (2003) The Commercialization of Intimate Life: Notes From Home and Work, Berkeley CA: University of California Press.
Incitti F, Rourke L, Rourke J and Kennard M (2003) Rural women family physicians: are they unique? Canadian Family Physician 49(March): 320-327.
Kilmartin M, Newell C and Line M (2002) The balancing act: key issues in the lives of women general practitioners in Australia, Medical Journal of Australia 177(15 July): 87-89.
Lapeyre N (2003) Professional and domestic work arrangements of women general practitioners in France, International Journal of Sociology and Health Policy 23(4/5): 97-122.
Lippert N and Tolhurst H (2001) Female Rural GPs: Findings of the National Female Rural GP Research Project, paper presented at 44th RACGP Scientific Convention, Sydney, September.
McKinlay J and Arches J (1985) Towards the proletarianization of physicians, International Journal of Health Services 15, 161-195.
Pearson A (1993) Expansion and extension of rural health workers' roles to increase access to health services in rural areas, paper presented at The National Rural Health Alliance 2nd National Rural Health Conference, University of New England, Armidale, NSW.
Pringle R (1998) Sex and Medicine: Gender, Power and Authority in the Medical Profession, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Rees S (1994) Economic rationalism: an ideology of exclusion, Australian Journal of Social Issues 29(2): 171-185.
Riska E (1993) Introduction, in E Riska and K Wegar (eds) Gender, Work and Medicine: Women and the Medical Division of Labour, London: Sage, pp.1-12.
Roach S (2002) Female General Practitioners in Remote and Rural Western Australia, Perth: Western Australian Centre for Remote and Rural Medicine.
Simmons D, Bolitho L, Phelps G, Ziffer R and Disher G (2001) The Victorian rural physicians survey, paper presented at The National Rural Health Conference, Canberra, ACT, 4-7 March.
Strasser R, Kamien M and Hays R (1997) National Rural General Practice Study, Melbourne: Monash University, Centre for Rural Health.
Strauss A and Corbin J (1994) Grounded theory methodology: an overview, in N Denzin and Y Lincoln (eds.) Handbook of Qualitative Research, Thousand Oaks: Sage, pp.273-285.
Sullivan O (2000) The division of domestic labour: twenty years of change? Sociology 34(3): 437-456.
Tedlock B (2000) Ethnography and ethnographic representation, in N Denzin and Y Lincoln (eds) Handbook of Qualitative Research, Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage, pp.455-486.
Wainer J (2000) Women and rural medical practice, South African Family Practice Journal 22(6): 19-23.
Wainer J (2001) Victorian Rural Women Practitioner Survey, Melbourne: Rural Workforce Agency of Victoria.
Wainer J (2003) Gender and the medical curriculum: a rural case study, Women and Health 37(4): 67-87.
Wainer J, Bryant L and Strasser R (2001) Sustainable rural practice for female general practitioners, Australian Journal of Rural Health 9(suppl.), S43-S48.
White C and Fergusson S (2001) Discussion Paper: Female Medical Practitioners in Rural and Remote Queensland: An Analysis of Findings, Issues And Trends, Brisbane: Queensland Rural Medical Support Agency.
Willis E (1989) Medical Dominance (revised edition) Sydney: Allen & Unwin.
Witz A (1992) Professions and Patriarchy, London: Routledge.
Young A, Dobson A and Byles J (2001) Access to health services in urban and rural Australia: a level playing field? Paper presented at Proceedings from the 6th National Rural Health Conference, Canberra, ACT, 4-7 March.

eContent Home




