chennai like many other women pulmonologists are no strangers to discrimination in medicine what worries doctors more than professional discrimination is lack of adequate medical literature for treating women with pulmonary disorders inadequate women samples in research leads to skewed results onesizefitsall approach misdiagnosis and increased morbidity and mortality among women said senior pulmonologist dr kumari indira ks at a meeting organised by women in pulmonologysince we dont have parity in samples of women in medical research there is a onesizefitsall approach this is because it is believed that fewer women have diabetes hypertension copd and other diseases said dr kumari indira but over the last few years we are seeing an increase in the incidence of occupational disorders sleep apnoea and lung cancer among women misdiagnosis and delayed treatment have also increased morbidity and mortality she said after the launch of her book on pulmonology disorders in women coauthored with dr vijayalakhsmi thanasekaran the results of a survey presented on monday at the sri ramachandra institute of higher education were surprising the survey described different kinds of discrimination women pulmonologists faced for instance 38 of women said they were asked uncomfortable questions in interviews at least 30 said their promotions were being delayed and they were given less opportunity to conduct research and around 15 said there was no pay parity women 37 said they had fewer opportunities to do challenging procedures or attending conferences compared to men for most doctors family 85 was the biggest support system followed by mentors 52 and colleagues 46 to overcome the professional hurdles 58 of women said they used assertiveness and candid expressions who chief scientist dr soumya swaminathan a paediatric pulmonologist herself said although more than 70 of healthcare workforce are women there are less than 30 of them in leadership roles we must make a conscious effort to reverse this