‘Boys’ club’ shutting women out of private hospitals

Just 6% of surgeons in private hospitals are women, says a report warning that a “private boys’ club” culture stops talented female doctors from getting work.

Research by the Royal College of Surgeons of England (RCS) found that for some specialties, such as orthopaedics, independent hospitals employ more male doctors than they do women.

Overall, only 488 of 7,934 surgeons at the country’s biggest private hospital chains are women — substantially lower than the proportion of female surgeons in the NHS.

More than half of the UK’s doctors are women, but surgery has traditionally been male-dominated and a series of reports in recent years warned of a culture of sexism and harassment.

Professor Felicity Meyer, a consultant vascular surgeon and chair of the Women in Surgery forum at RCS England, said: “The independent sector now delivers a growing share of surgical care, yet women remain strikingly underrepresented within its surgical workforce.

“RCS England’s own work has repeatedly shown that this is not just an issue of fairness, but one that affects the resilience, safety and sustainability of the profession as a whole and ultimately impacts patient safety."

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Source: The Times, 1 March 2026