The title for a surgeon is Mister.
Surgery is one of the only professions left that still uses a gendered title for the role.
Adelaide’s Women’s and Children’s Hospital will be the first hospital in Australia to phase out the gendered title for surgeons, and replace it with the gender neutral title of Doctor.
ABC Radio Adelaide’s Sonya Feldhoff spoke to Dr Mark Moore, a Craniofacial Surgeon and the Acting Divisional Director of Surgery at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital.
He says the decision to change the title is to remove discrimination.
Credits: Presenter Sonya Feldhoff
- Male surgeons are always addressed as Mr in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.
- The tradition arose before 1800 when physicians were by definition doctors who possessed a university medical degree (an MD); surgeons seldom had any formal qualifications
- The growth of voluntary hospitals in the 18th century brought high status to surgeons
- After the founding of the Royal College of Surgeons of London in 1800, surgeons had a formal qualification (the MRCS)
- Surgeons became so proud to be distinguished from physicians that the title of Mr became a badge of honour
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