How can female dentists balance work and family?

By Dr Alizey Shahid

Warming with a concept of feminism encourages women to pursue their dream and step up. It is a pity that work/ life balance even today remains an unresolved issue for a woman. Regardless, the essences of dentistry provide an opportunity for the female dentists to balance between work and family. It also helps in navigating through struggle if properly planned and managed.

Many female dentists are overwhelmed and struggle with double responsibilities resulting in mental stress.

Top 5 solutions to help female dentists balance work and family

Comfortable attire:

An appropriate attire to wear is a daily day struggle for women, especially for hijabi women. The trouble associated with the shirt length or design. The comfort of pants, and hanging dupattas and sleeves with a white coat is something each female dentist can relate to. Hence, attire comfort is an important thing to understand which, supports ease in dental procedures. Thus, wearing scrubs with a custom-made hijab is an easy way to remain stress-free for an everyday choice of clothes and disturbance during work. Moreover, reduces the risk of contamination for the family with any kind of splatters present on the clothes.

Timings:

Early morning clinics should be encouraged with flexible afternoons. Although many females are working women; however, an equal number are at home working moms or housewives who often feel comfortable managing their personal work during the daytime. Thus, early morning appointments would allow a good patient-dentist interaction and create more family time. In addition, giving 2 hrs afternoon break would be effective for the female dentist to shortly visit their home for lunch and attend to kid's needs.

Personal time:

In between work and life balance, personal time often gets lost which, leads to stress and depression that is common among the females. Taking time off in the week apart from Sundays to do something productive. This can include article writing, painting, voluntary work and spa time is the best way to maintain a healthy balance. Therefore, a suitable option can be scheduling alternative time off for personal time and errands.

Academic roles:

The female dentist often restraints them between the clinic and home that limits their clinical practice to the previously gained knowledge; hence, many fail to comply with changing technology and new concepts.

Adopting leadership to polish oneself to develop in their own field. Thus, part-time lecturer, conducting researches, supporting students academically, conducting workshops and participate in international conferences is an effective way to be recognised and uplift in the dental society.

Learn and develop:

Development is a part of the experience which gains with time. However, it is influenced by a person’s attitude and behaviour. Females often ignore attending conferences and workshops due to added responsibilities and constrained time.

Thus, each female dentist should reorganise her goals to attend educational forums and enrol in courses at least once a month to remain at par with others.

-The author is contributing writer at Dental News and can be reached at alizey.shahid@yahoo.com