The gender gap in Canadian health care

Differences in practice between male and female doctors, as described in our article,1 are important to uncover, not only in terms of human resource patterns, but also perhaps in terms of the quality of care provided. The cost–benefit analysis that would be involved in deciding whether governments should fund training for a group of part-time doctors is a complex one, involving many factors in addition to number of hours worked, number of patients seen and number of years in medical service. We have not conducted studies or analyses of these factors, although they are certainly worthy of scientific exploration.

Kirsteen R. Burton Department of Public Health Sciences University of Toronto Toronto, Ont. Ian K. Wong Faculty of Medicine University of British Columbia Vancouver, BC