Obstetrics & Gynaecology
Obstetrics and gynecology is a discipline of medical science that studies women′s health and reproduction. The specialty is involved in ensuring the wellbeing of women by taking care of their reproductive health both when they are well and when they are sick. It concerns itself not only with the prevention, diagnosis and management of diseases specific to women but also their fetuses. Obstetric care starts from preconception and continues to the postpartum period. Gynecology is concerned with the screening, diagnosis and treatment of disorders of women′s genital/reproductive organs throughout their life.
Obstetrics and gynecology combines medicine and surgery, which is a major appeal for many doctors entering the specialty. However, it is a broad discipline. Despite the fact that several subspecialties, such as maternal‐fetal medicine, reproductive medicine and infertility, urogynecology (female pelvic medicine and reconstructive surgery), sexual and reproductive health and gynecological oncology have developed, and some others, such as community gynecology, pediatric and adolescent gynecology, are evolving, today more than 70% of obstetricians and gynecologists work as generalists.
However, there is an increasing trend among these professionals towards working exclusively as a gynecologist or as an obstetrician. Our discipline is very broad, and it is difficult and time consuming to evolve into a “jack of all trades” first, before mastering the area of clinical practice you eventually choose to engage in. Whether and to what extent general training is desirable and necessary demands some reflection. Perhaps the time has come to discuss whether splitting our discipline into two separate specialties, i.e. obstetrics and gynecology, should be considered in the long run. In this scenario, a reorganization of the specialty to include reproductive medicine and early pregnancy complications in obstetrics might be logical and advantageous.
