[Few and sporadic gender elements in the medical curriculum at Umea. Physicians play a key role when implementing suggestions for improvement].

An investigation was conducted at the medical school in Umeå Sweden, to get a picture of the education that was offered to the students about gender and gender issues in medicine during the autumn of 2001. A few ambitious examples were reported but as a whole a gender perspective was lacking and not co-ordinated between courses. There was no space in the curriculum for gender theory, which implied that all teachers that paid attention to a gender perspective had to start from the beginning. They had no idea what ideas and theories had already been discussed. When sex or gender were focused on it was foremost biological aspects that were put forward while social, psychological and cultural aspects were not illuminated. No attention was paid to sex or gender bias. The abuse of women was in the curricula only three times during the five and a half years of medical training. Based on this inventory a proposal to develop education on gender issues has been outlined and approved by the faculty board.