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Despite the fact that 17% of medical doctors and over 30% of recent medical graduates are women in Japan, they account for only 8.8% of members of the Japanese Association for Acute Medicine. A new recruitment strategy attractive to women is required to increase the number of emergency physicians. We performed a questionnaire survey of medical residents to elucidate the factors that might affect their decision to pursue emergency medicine as their specialty. Fifty-one residents, including 20 women, participated in this survey. The questionnaire included questions relating to future applications to specialties, issues of the balance between life (marriage or child-care) and work, and its influence on the decisions on future specialties. Of those surveyed, 33% considered choosing emergency medicine as their specialty. However, women did not often decide to pursue emergency medicine as their specialty. Residents who likely apply to pursue emergency medicine as their specialty thought less of the importance of life-work balance (p<0.05), while women often considered this issue as important (p<0.01). Factor analysis indicated that candidates who were likely to pursue emergency medicine were men who did not consider the issue of a life-work balance as important. This study suggests that importance should be attached to establishment of a good life-work balance to encourage women to pursue emergency medicine as their specialty. 2009;