Since childhood, Lucrecia Sta. Ana, M.D., a colon and rectal surgeon affiliated with Memorial Hermann Memorial City Medical Center and Memorial Hermann Katy Hospital, knew a career in medicine was in her blood.<\/p>\n
\u201cI always told my parents since I was 4 or 5 years old that I was going to be a doctor,\u201d said the 40-year-old Houston native. \u201cMy dad, knowing how hard it was to be a physician and have a family, would always tell me, \u2018Don\u2019t do it. It\u2019s too much work. It may not be worth it.\u2019 I kind of fought him and said, \u2018Nope, this is what I\u2019m going to do.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Sta. Ana grew up envisioning a career as a veterinarian or a pediatrician, but after her third year of medical school at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, she realized her true passion was surgery\u2014a field still dominated by men.<\/p>\n
While women account for nearly half of the population of medical students and residents, the surgical field remains an inveterate boys\u2019 club. In academic surgery, women account for just 22 percent of tenured faculty and only 1 percent of department chairs, according to a recent report by the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC).<\/p>\n
In the operating room, 5 percent of orthopedic surgeons, 8 percent of urologists and 15 percent of plastic surgeons are female, based on another study by the AAMC. In general surgery, 19 percent are female, with an even smaller percentage representing women in sub-specialties, including colon and rectal surgery.<\/p>\n
The overwhelmingly male environment in surgery manifested in little ways for Sta. Ana. For instance, the two operating room lounge entrances at her previous hospital were labeled \u201cmale physicians\u201d and \u201cfemale staff.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe males were all physicians and the females were all staff. They were the nurses and the techs,\u201d Sta. Ana said. \u201cThat\u2019s all changed because there are female physicians and male staff. \u2026 Most people laugh it off or blow it off, but the little things make a difference. It makes you feel like, \u2018Yeah, I am part of this. I am a physician just like you guys are.\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n
For the most part, Sta. Ana said her colleagues treat her equally and respectfully. The attitudes towards women in medicine are changing for the better, but female doctors still face unconscious biases.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you walk into the exam room, patients assume you\u2019re a nurse,\u201d Sta. Ana said. \u201cEighty percent of the time, people thought I was the nurse. Any female physician you talk to has been called a nurse, has been called the cleaning lady, has been called anything before being called the doctor.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even during her training, Sta. Ana didn\u2019t have any female mentors or attendings to look up to. As she rose through the ranks, earning the title chief resident and receiving Excellence in Teaching awards, she eventually became a mentor for incoming female surgeons.<\/p>\n
\u201cI never pictured myself being a mentor because I thought, \u2018I\u2019m just doing what I need to do to get there,\u2019 but I hope to be that,\u201d she said. \u201cI tell people when they come through, \u2018You can do anything you want. You\u2019re not going to do it all. You\u2019re not going to be perfect.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
As a mother of two, Sta. Ana admits to experiencing the \u201cmom guilt\u201d of missing out on her children\u2019s activities and not being able to drop them off or pick them up from school or events. <\/p>\n
\u201cNo one asks men, \u2018How\u2019s your work-life balance?\u2019 \u2018How do you deal with the kids?\u2019 No one ever asks men how to do that. No one ever guilts men into anything,\u201d Sta. Ana said.<\/p>\n
But she continues to encourage young female doctors to pursue their careers because \u201cyou do what you love,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a mom, it\u2019s not bad to have that [guilt] because that just shows you\u2019re a mom,\u201d she added. \u201cYou want to be involved, but it doesn\u2019t mean you can\u2019t have amazing careers.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Since childhood, Lucrecia Sta. Ana, M.D., a colon and rectal surgeon affiliated with Memorial Hermann Memorial City Medical Center and Memorial Hermann Katy Hospital, knew a career in medicine was in her blood. \u201cI always told my parents since I was 4 or 5 years old that I was going to be a doctor,\u201d said […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":8993,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1757,1758,1746,63],"yoast_head":"\n