Is There a Problem with Women Working in Academic Medicine?
Examining imposterism, womanload, safety, and the UK academic workforce crisis.
Posted January 5, 2026 | Reviewed by Lybi Ma
By Sophie Binks, DPhil
Dating back many years, it has been recognized that women are underrepresented in academic medicine. In 2008, the same year I began medical school—and after a degree in languages as well as my time in the workplace—the BMA published a detailed report on women in clinical academia. Across the range of metrics, women were unsurprisingly underrepresented in the field, including only 11 percent of professorial positions held by female clinical academics. While considerations of having and raising children are often at the forefront of discussions about women’s career advancement, the BMA report examined multiple and diverse factors that impede women’s career progression.
Since then, have matters improved for women pursuing research roles? A recent publication in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2020 suggested that, while more women are present in the field, they are not equally appointed at the highest ranks. There has been some improvement, but it falls below equity. For example, in the US, the number of female full professors increased from 21 percent in 2013 to 29 percent in 2023. In the UK, we need to set this against the recent description of a crisis in academic medicine. Medical academics have decreased from 4.7 percent to 3.4 percent of consultants between 2009 and 2024, and early-career researchers (a description which includes my current role as a clinical lecturer) decreased by nearly 29 percent since 2015. This situation affects clinical academic men and women. There are many drivers, but some include precarious funding and job opportunities, as well as a lack of a national strategy to value and retain the academic workforce.
What is academic medicine?
Maybe that is because it’s not always well understood what clinical academics do. I’m often asked to describe what my job actually is! My current role is split between clinical time (seeing and treating patients) and research. Being involved in medical care confers valuable insight into problems that we can identify clinically as important to improve patient treatment or care. Another important bridge is enrolling patients in various forms of clinical research and ensuring that the right cases are put forward to answer the specific question being asked.
Imposter syndrome in female academics
It is fulfilling and rewarding work, but can lead to a feeling of being stretched across two spheres, and falling short in both. This self-criticism is something that several reports show women are prone to. In the BMA’s original 2008 study, one theme emerged of “walking a tightrope between clinical and academic careers” and the associated challenges of time management . More recently, in a project commissioned by Imperial College London, several medical women described being beset by imposter phenomenon – a feeling that you don’t really deserve your place at the table. This phenomenon was first identified in high-achieving women and is recognised as a mentoring need by the National Institute for Health and Care Research. It was likewise the joint leading topic raised as a pressing issue within my department’s women in clinical neuroscience survey.
Networks like this are needed; “Am I good enough” is a theme that has come up on multiple occasions in recent months when advising or mentoring excellent up-and-coming female clinician scientists. This has long been acknowledged as a female trait. For example, in the 2008 BMA report: “Women approach appointments and promotions with a tick box mentality and may need encouragement to be more risk-taking and to think positively about themselves and their careers.” This was also spoken about in the Imperial data, with one respondent saying that: “Many colleagues, mainly the female ones, don’t blow our own trumpets much.”
The same Imperial report identified something called the womanload , which I think expresses a host of issues affecting women clinical academics, aside from and in addition to familial responsibilities. It covers broader expectations of women from the home setting (more usually being the designated person for domestic emergencies), to allocated roles in the workplace (an anticipation that women take on additional pastoral, support, and communications focussed tasks), to expectations of women’s behaviour at a cultural level whereby a comparable ambition and drive can be viewed negatively in female compared with male academics. I found this concept helpful as it recognises that women have myriad issues as well as those relating to maternity and childcare, important though those are. For example, I do not generally have conversations with male academics who are worrying about finding time to do the cleaning or what’s for dinner, and they do not lack the confidence to ask for promotions or research opportunities.
Of course, many of these issues can affect men and women, but evidence suggests they are particularly relevant to women. The final topic is perhaps more obviously a disproportionate concern for women.
Recently, the renowned actress Saoirse Ronan was a guest on a popular UK chat show, the Graham Norton Show. She voiced the topic of women’s safety, and this resonated strongly with women across the country, with her response going viral. “That's what girls have to think about all the time. Am I right, ladies?” She totally is. One example: I recently attended an academic conference and had a very uncomfortable encounter with a taxi driver, which affected my personal safety. Much debate and academic meetings take place at conferences, and hotel accommodations can be far from the venue in unfamiliar cities. Rather than being able to relax and interact with colleagues, a woman may be worrying about how and at what time you will be getting back safely.
I feel fortunate to have opportunities and be doing genuinely novel, scientifically engaging, and societally useful work. While being a woman has not directly disadvantaged me, highlighting some obstacles that women academics face may be useful.
Sophie Binks, DPhil, is an academic clinical lecturer, Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences; Honorary Neurology SpR, Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust in the UK.
Bravata DM, Watts SA, Keefer AL, et al . Prevalence, Predictors, and Treatment of Impostor Syndrome: a Systematic Review. J Gen Intern Med. 2020 Apr;35(4):1252-1275.
British Medical Association. Women in Academic Medicine. Developing Equality in Governance and Management for Career Progression. Full Report 2008. London; BMA; 2008.
Lautenberger DM, Dandar VM. The State of Women in Academic Medicine 2023-2024: Progressing Toward Equity. Washington, DC: AAMC; November 2024.
Muradoglu, M., Horne, Z., Hammond, M. D., et al. (2022). Women—particularly underrepresented minority women—and early-career academics feel like impostors in fields that value brilliance. Journal of Educational Psychology, 114 (5), 1086–1100.
Research Coach on behalf of Imperial College, London. Exploring the Experiences and Progression of Women in Clinical Academia. London; 2024.
Richter KP, Clark L, Wick JA et al . Women Physicians and Promotion in Academic Medicine. N Engl J Med. 2020 Nov 26;383(22):2148-2157.
Strain D, Gibb J. The UK is rapidly losing medical academics and without them the NHS 10 year plan is at risk. BMJ 2025; 390:r1808.
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Ava Easton, Ph.D., with the University of Liverpool, Sarosh R Irani, DPhil, of the Mayo Clinic, and Jessica Fish, Ph.D., of the University of Glasgow, among others are researchers with Encephalitis International.
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