Women in Critical Care

We had our first ‘kick off’ meeting for Women in Critical Care. We had 59 pre-registrants and 17 participants for the first zoom meeting on February 23. Our objective was to introduce the mission as well as to decide a structure and goals for the year. We discussed a website launch as well as a first, official meeting on March 17 at the 2022 SOCCA Virtual Annual Meeting where we will have an invited guest speaker: Dr. Deborah Cook (a truly inspiring woman intensivist).

After introductions, we discussed the following agenda items:

Need and Feasibility for a Women in Critical Care Group

1) To provide a platform for a diverse group of individuals engaged in various facets of anesthesia critical care practice, and includes academicians involved in research/clinical care/administration, private practitioners, junior, mid-level, and senior faculty.

2) The purpose of the group is to encourage women from various career tracks to engage in CCM activities, and also to address issues that are important to ensure equitable representation of women in the field of critical care.

Data was presented from the registration survey of 59 registrants:

Additional degrees of registrants:
MS (5) MPH (3) PhD (6) MBA (1) FCCM (3)

Title: Instructor (2) Assistant Professor (17) Associate Professor (12) Professor (4) Director (5) Vice Chair (2) PD/Assist PD (2)

Level of training: Fellow (7) Resident (3) Student (1)

Practice setting: Pvt Practice (1)

Years in practice:
27(1), 25(2), 22(1), 20(1), 19(2), 15(2), 14(2), 13(3), 12(2), 11(3), 10(1), 9(3), 8(7), 7(5), 6(1), 4(2), 3(1), 2(1), 1(4).

Preferences for Women in Critical Care

Speakers List/Panel (46)
Advice (44)
Networking (42)
Invite Speakers (41)
Sponsorship (32)
Mental Wellbeing (29)
Developing a Network (3)

Write-ins:

• Social Media Platform (1)
• Private Practice (1)
• Recruit Women (1)

Our content foundation will focus on:

1) Leadership/Mentoring

2) Academic challenges/Career path

3) Work life balance/Mental health

Our brand pillars are:
Quality, Compassion and Benevolence.

In the coming year we will plan:

1. Webinar. Some topics considered were “Unique balance of academic and personal/family pressures in CCM and how to deal with them,” “Multi-dimensional aspect of CCM and how women excel in this field,” and “Academic vs Private practice- best fit?"
2. Speaker/Panelist list: liaise with SOCCA membership/mentoring committees.
3. Newsletter and SOCCA Drip: (articles 4 times per year), update, member interviews (nominations, standard format), webinar content, research findings, content on professional wellbeing, psychological and social support.
4. Research report: One report at the end of the year (next meeting)- member survey on professional satisfaction, burnout, or fulfillment?
5. Award: when more developed; for next meeting 3/23 (from nominations).

We asked for volunteers for Chair, Vice Chair, and a Working group (membership committee members) for writing, networking for research, sponsorship, and wellbeing.

We will plan a write up for the “Women in Medicine Month” piece as well, in September.

Hopefully, we will plan an in-person meeting at ASA and the next SOCCA meeting. With the support of the SOCCA BOD and members we hope to make Women in Critical Care a success and to improve membership representation amongst women in CCM. A lot of work needs to be done and we hope we can improve the national and global efforts towards this goal.

Author

Shahla Siddiqui, MD

Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Boston, Massachusetts