Table 5.

Themes Related to When Women Choose Careers in Academic Medicine, Gleaned from Interviews with 53 Women Academic Physicians, 2010

Theme	Associated quotations
As a practicing physician	I thought about it in medical school and in residency…decided to do private practice for several years…then ultimately after doing that for two years decided that I just wanted to go back to doing academics…the final decision was [when I was] out [in private practice].
As a resident and fellow	- I had been thinking about it during residency…I don’t think during medical school I really had any clue what academic medicine was about…I sort of started thinking about it when I was in residency because you begin thinking about what the next step is going to be…and I didn’t decide finally until I looked at different job options…when I got out of fellowship, I thought, well, I can do this.
	- I started thinking about it in my fourth year of residency, and then as I applied for my fellowships, I sort of started thinking about it more and while I was doing my fellowship there were two women who were in the fellowship…And so, when I looked at them and some of the other people there, I was like…this is the kind of job I want.
	- Well, in residency I was not going to do a fellowship…I was just going to hang up my shingle…then I met a woman who became my mentor and got very, very excited about becoming a [specialist]…so the next step was doing a fellowship in [specialty]…once you become a top specialist the chances of your staying in academic medicine are much higher.
	- Definitely in residency. I did a month-long stint with a private practice guy and when I started looking for jobs…just felt he was running patients through…he just did not seem happy…he did not ever stop at the end of the day to look up anything, to read about a patient…I thought, “Aren’t you interested in the new drugs or what is going on?” I thought, I don’t want to lose that.
As a medical student	- I think I solidified it in medical school
	- I probably was on that career path by the end of … medical school because I took an elective in academics at that point…but I think the decision was actually permanently made in early residency.
	- In medical school…nothing…I really didn’t know anything…there was so much else going on that my understanding of what it meant to be an academic physician was minimal.
	- When I was a student academic medicine to me was where residents go to get trained and then it’s where attendings teach, other than that I thought, “Oh, when people graduate they will probably go into private practice.” I didn’t really know all the draws for academic medicine. I just thought it was the place where people go when they liked to teach.