The Sexual Harassment of Medical Students: Victims, Experiences, Impact, and Barriers to Reporting

Abstract

Abstract Background: Sexual harassment of medical students is a growing concern. Sexual harassment is an unethical and illegal conduct. Yet, medical students are at a unique disadvantage to be victimized to due organizational failures, fear of retaliation, and unique power dynamics. As more women, minorities, and vulnerable groups enter the medical field, the time is ripe for proactive measures to ensure their empowerment and protect in light of such heinous and harmful acts. Main body of the abstract: Original research studies, which examined the sexual harassment of medical students were identified on the PubMed database using the key terms, sexual harassment, and medical students. A total of 36 studies were identified. The purpose of this review is to highlight the key findings in the original research literature on the sexual harassment of medical students, and to identify themes in hopes to inspire progressive solutions to embolden student safety. Short conclusion: There is a growing global body of literature that has examined the sexual harassment experiences of medical students. Themes across the studies reveal a wide array of experiences. Medical students, especially females, are faced with harassment from professors, colleagues, and patients. The impact of harassment is far reaching, and includes depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, loss of concentration and academic interests, changing specialty of interest and relocation. There is a number of barriers to reporting these events, notably including a lack of institutional response, lack of time to go forward with a complaint, fear of retaliation and career impact. Proactive measures are needed to protect the students and embolden them and provide them with safe and accessible means to reporting these events, as well as ensuring adequate responses to reports on the institutional level, and continued emotional and career support are needed.