AUSTIN, Texas — Unlike on television – looking at you, "Grey's Anatomy" – only about one-third of surgeons in the real world are women.
But that's not the case at the Dell Medical School at the University of Texas.
"To have any women surgery residents is still pretty rare," Brittany Bankhead-Kendall, MD, MS, said. "But to have three in the chief role position, and doing as good as we are, is really rare."
Bankhead-Kendall is one of three chief surgical residents at Dell Med who are women.
"It requires extra work and extra hours because women are powerhouses at whatever we do," Bankhead-Kendall said. "We work really hard, and we want to be really good at both. So it will be extra hard, but it will be extra rewarding."
She said while she thinks there is an upward trend in female surgeons, that hasn't always been the case.
"A lot of women have to weigh the balance of their home life and their personal life and also professionally what they can accomplish," Bankhead-Kendall said.
As a mom of two, she admitted to feeling defeated before. But, she encourages anyone thinking about getting into the field to not let anyone tell them they aren't capable of succeeding.
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