Objectives: To examine differences attributable to sex of family physicians in their practices and in their perceptions of sexual history taking and safer sex counseling, and to ascertain whether sex of physicians influences counseling about condoms.
Design: Cross-sectional survey.
Setting: Quebec family practices.
Participants: Recently graduated (1991) Quebec family physicians: 54 men and 92 women.
Main outcome measures: Frequency and content of sexual history, frequency of safer sex counseling, perceived level of comfort in taking a sexual history, perceived adequacy of medical training to take sexual histories, perceived difficulty with sexual history taking according to patients' characteristics, and perceived effectiveness of safer sex counseling.
Results: Response rate was 80% of 183 physicians contacted. There were few differences attributable to sex of physician in family physicians' practices and perceptions regarding sexual history taking. Men's perceptions regarding the difficulty of sexual history taking did not vary according to patient's sex, but most women reported more difficulty with male patients. Male physicians reported more difficulty with teenagers; female physicians experienced more difficulty questioning adults. More than 85% of male and female physicians reported recommending condom use to a patient in their practice at least weekly. Women physicians seemed to do more condom-related counseling than their male colleagues, even after controlling for other variables. Salaried practice in a local community health centre did not influence condom-related counseling.
Conclusions: Women family physicians are more inclined than men to counsel patients about condom use. Increasing numbers of women in family practice could have a beneficial effect on prevention of STDs and undesired pregnancies.