Los Angeles—Among pharmacists, as well as physicians and surgeons, women are making up an increasingly large percentage of the profession.
“In a nationally representative sample, little to no increase in Black or Hispanic men was observed among physicians and surgeons, pharmacists, and dentists between 2000 and 2019,” according to a research letter in JAMA Network Open. “While there were increases in Black and Hispanic women in these occupations, increases among White and Asian women were larger. Altogether, increases in representation of these 4 subgroups of women were accompanied by large declines in the proportion of White men.”
Researchers from the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, and colleagues said they set out to quantify diversity of the U.S. healthcare workforce and changes during the past 2 decades.
The authors point out that, while greater diversity among healthcare workers appears to improve care for patients with diverse cultural, social, economic, and clinical needs, little data is available on trends in diversity and representativeness of U.S. healthcare workers by occupation. The study team used US Census data from 2000 to 2019 to analyze trends in representativeness in select health care occupations by race/ethnicity and sex.
In the data, participants self-reported occupation, race—White, Black, American Indian or Alaska Native, Chinese, Japanese, other Asian or Pacific Islander, other race, two major races, or more than three major races—and ethnicity—not Hispanic, Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, and other Hispanic origin.
The researchers included participants who selected Chinese, Japanese, or other Asian or Pacific Islander in the Asian category, while those who selected Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, and other were included in the Hispanic category. Excluded were those who selected other race, two major races, or three or more major races. That left four groups: non-Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black, non-Hispanic Asian, and Hispanic.
The focus was on two time periods: 2000 to 2004 and 2015 to 2019. For each occupation, the study team calculated the change in percentage in each race/ethnicity and sex subgroup between those two periods using linear regression.
The study included 1.6 million individuals, with most, 79.1%, being women, across six healthcare occupations. Results indicated that the percentage of White men decreased in both time periods in relatively more well-paid occupations such as pharmacists, physicians, and surgeons and dentists.
As for pharmacists, no change was observed in the percentage who were Black men (difference, –0.06 [95% CI, –0.8 to 0.6] percentage points). On the other hand, the percentage of pharmacists who were Black women increased by 1.3 (95% CI, 0.6 to 2.0) percentage points, although increases for White and Asian women in these occupations were larger than for Black and Hispanic women.
Still, the authors point out, an analysis of population representativeness in 2015 to 2019 shows that Black and Hispanic men and women were still significantly underrepresented relative to the U.S. population in more remunerative occupations.
“In a nationally representative sample, little to no increase in Black or Hispanic men was observed among physicians and surgeons, pharmacists, and dentists between 2000 and 2019,” the researchers conclude. “While there were increases in Black and Hispanic women in these occupations, increases among White and Asian women were larger. Altogether, increases in representation of these four subgroups of women were accompanied by large declines in the proportion of White men.”
They add that, in other healthcare occupations, such as nurses, therapists, and healthcare aides, increases were across most minority subgroups during the study periods.
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