Women more likely to die under male surgeons’ care

The findings have prompted calls to urgently address the paucity of female surgeons

Women have a greater risk of death or post-surgical complications when they are operated on by a male rather than a female surgeon, a landmark Canadian study suggests.

After accounting for surgery type and hospital-related factors, female patients were 32% more likely to die within 30 days of surgery when operated on by a man, data from more than 1.3 million patients show.