Sexism in the Medical Field: An Interview with Dr. Suzanne Langely
May 2020
By Selena Rathwell
Dr. Suzanne Langley has had a self-professed “charmed life”. Langley was born to a middle-class family in Ontario in 1949. Her father, who finished grade 10, worked for the government, while her mother, who finished grade 8, worked as a homemaker. Langley was encouraged to pursue her dream of becoming a medical doctor by her family. She graduated from the University of Toronto in 1974, then worked in Toronto until relocating to Vancouver in 1981. In 1985, she and her husband bought a small family practice in a suburb of Vancouver, and she worked there until her retirement in 2018. In that time, she enjoyed working as a GP for changing families - as a GP, she saw four generations of one family. She was my doctor when I was twelve, and I have been close friends with her daughter for almost two decades.
That is not to say that Langley's journey to becoming a doctor was without hurdles. Girls simply were not encouraged to enter the sciences at high school in the 1960s. There were only two female students in Langley’s graduating sciences classes. She faced social isolation too, feeling that she did not belong with the male students in her science classes, nor her female colleagues who were not in science classes. At medical school in Toronto, she was one of twenty women in a class of 220. She faced hostility and was made to “feel diminutive” by her male classmates, who would tell her “she was taking a man’s spot”, and that she should give up the medical profession because “she was just going to quit and have children”. When she began to practice medicine, there was a casual sexism that pervaded the work culture which was not addressed or commented upon. Langley recalled assisting a surgeon who told her, “that’s a good girl” when she did as she was told.
When asked about the issues that women currently face in Canada, Langley spoke about the rights of indigenous people, and commented upon the intersectional nature of discrimination. She said, “it's much more complicated than equal pay, there are huge issues of socio-economic change that need to happen”. She commented upon how religious and cultural practices impact gender rights and it is hard to separate these issues. As a doctor, Langley also had a unique insight into the gender disparities in medical research, informing me that while heart disease is the number one cause of death for women, the majority of research into the illness is conducted from a male perspective. She also informed me that most drugs “were only tested on men” and directed me to the Women’s College Hospital in Toronto for more information. She also stated that “women are much less likely to be referred to cardiac rehab than men, and as women demonstrate different symptoms of heart attacks than men, more research and investigation is needed”.
The world has clearly changed since Langley was a student in medical school. Her daughter has now become a doctor herself, and is entering a workplace where 54% of doctors are female. When asked what advice she had for girls growing up now, Langley said, “While I think it's important these girls know their history, they don’t need my advice. Girls today are different”. Langley continued to remark on the differences in upbringing and socialization between the generations, stating that she was told to “keep yourself to yourself and don’t make a fuss”. She mentioned Alice Munro’s collection of stories Who Do You Think You Are? as accurately depicting the situation. When Langely grew up in the 1950s, she was taught to be, above all else, “accommodating”. Commenting on gender roles today, Langley said, “the progress that women have made is fantastic. We can never go back to what it was before. Now girls are braver and bolder than ever before”.