Gender titles dropped for all surgeons after push from Adelaide’s WCH

All surgeons will now be called Dr rather than Mister, Mrs, Miss or Ms, after a push from Adelaide’s WCH.

Surgeons will have no gender-based titles after their peak body adopted a push by the Women’s and Children’s Hospital to dump Mr and Mrs or Ms and simply refer to them all as Dr.

The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons will phase out the titles in favour of Dr – but will stick with academic titles such as Professor.

The college will use the title Dr to refer to surgeons and “encourage them to make this change in their private or personal practices.”

The proposal which sparked the change at the Women’s and Children’s Health Network,

written by plastic surgeons Dr Anthony Porter and Dr Amy Jeeves and consultant Claire Parkinson, said all female surgeons in SA were referred to as Doctor while male surgeons are referred to as Mister in two thirds of cases.

It noted “surgery is the only profession that continues to use these confusing gendered titles”.

Dr Porter welcomed the college move and urged SA Health to adopt it statewide, although it has no plans to implement the policy.

“It’s an excellent initiative by the College of Surgeons,” Dr Porter said. “Patients will find our titles less confusing as we are all doctor now. It also ends the perception that surgeons are somehow superior to other specialties.”

Australian Medical Association SA president Dr Michelle Atchison. Picture: Tricia Watkinson

Dr Christine Lai, chair of the college’s fellowship services committee and based at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, said using Mr for surgeons dated back to the 18th century. “Surgery is the only profession that continues to use gendered titles in Australia and New Zealand,” Dr Lai said.

“Gendered titles can be confusing for patients because they create the perception that Dr X and Mr Y have different qualifications, despite both being surgeons”.

A college statement says gendered titles create power and status differences between surgeons and other medical professionals; male and female surgeons; and married and unmarried women.

Southern Adelaide Local Health Network director of Surgery and Perioperative Medicine, Professor Robert Padbury, said the title had not been used in the south for about 45 years.

“We have not used the Mr designation at Flinders Medical Centre from its inception in 1976,” he said.

“We have regarded it as archaic and quite absurd.”

Australian Medical Association SA president Dr Michelle Atchison, pictured, said gendered titles were outdated and sexist.

“It is a practice that should have been abandoned years ago,” she said.