September 19, 2003
A: FROM MENTOR JOAN LUSK IN RI
The American Medical Associationhas statistics on line - for example, 7.6% of physicians were women in 1970 but 24.6% were in 2001. (I don't mean to imply there were a lot of sex-change operations! Obviously, new physicians were more likely to be women.).
http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/article/171-195.html

The American Medical Association also sells a book of data for $40 - you might find a copy in a university or medical library - The Health Professions Education Data Book, 2003-2004 includes 22 tables of data for nearly 6,000 educational programs in 57 allied health professions:
http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/printcat/10250.html

I didn't find similar statistics by gender on other health care occupations, but I did find a page at the Bureau of Labor Statistics giving pay scales and numbers of people in a long list of such occupations. Some past questions asked about salaries, so I thought I might as well add this link.
http://www.bls.gov/oes/2001/oes290000.htm