Progress in neurosurgery: Contributions of women neurosurgeons in Asia and Australasia

Drummond, Katharine J.; Kim, Eliana; Apuahe, Esther; Darbar, Aneela; Kedia, Shweta; Kuo, Meng-Fai; Lewis, Elizabeth; Lucena, Lynne Lourdes N.; Maixner, Wirginia; Mo, Su Myat; Olson, Sarah; Phusoongnern, Woralux; Shrestha, Resha; Yan, Lin; Rosseau, Gail

doi:10.1016/j.jocn.2021.02.002

Cited by 28 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Globally, only 8.4% of the neurosurgery residents are females and in Nepal, only 5.8% of neurosurgeons are females. 7,13 In our study, only 5 (23.8%) female medical graduates among 21 were willing to be a neurosurgeon. This is similar to the findings by Balogun et al in Nigeria.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 59%

Neurosurgery as a Career Choice among Recent Medical Graduates from the Institute of Medicine, Nepal: A Cross-sectional Study

et al. 2022

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Introduction: The career choice of a medical graduate is often a complex process with multiple factors playing a part. Neurosurgery in Nepal is gradually growing and there is a huge interest in the academia to draw more graduates into neurosurgery. There is a paucity of data regarding the career choice of medical graduates from Nepal. The aim of this study was to determine the potential barriers and facilitators for choosing a future career as a neurosurgeon. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out on all recent medical graduates in the last two weeks of their internship in 2021 from three medical colleges in Kathmandu. Variables included demographic characteristics, preferred specialty, willingness to choose neurosurgery and reasons for it, and the reasons for not choosing neurosurgery if done so. Frequency and percentages were used to describe the categorical variables. Mean and median were used to describe continuous variables. A comparison between two categorical variables (factors for choosing Neurosurgery as a career and factors that encouraged not to choose Neurosurgery) was made. Results: Twenty-one out of 87 respondents preferred neurosurgery as their future career. The common motivating factors for choosing neurosurgery were innate interest in neurosurgery, motivation from seniors and mentors during clinical clerkship, and the glamour of the specialty. The main barriers were the perceived generally poor outcome of the neurosurgical patients, long hours of surgery, innate disinterestedness, long training and not having enough opportunities to get accredited training in the country. Conclusion: Around Twenty-four percentage of graduates preferred neurosurgery as a future career. When the barriers are addressed there will probably be more medical graduates inclined to join Neurosurgery which will help in solving the shortage of neurosurgical manpower in Nepal.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 59%

Neurosurgery as a Career Choice among Recent Medical Graduates from the Institute of Medicine, Nepal: A Cross-sectional Study

et al. 2022

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“…Women neurosurgeons have been heads of neurosurgery departments and training programs, emphasizing their significant contribution to the specialty in the Philippines, parallel to the rest of Asia and Australasia. 31 Finally, a greater proportion of residency graduates are pursuing subspecialty training, mostly in North America and Asia. Larger case volumes and specialist care have been correlated with improved outcomes in neurosurgery.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Neurosurgical Workforce of the Philippines

Baticulon,

Lucena,

Gimenez

et al. 2023

Neurosurgery

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BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: No study has comprehensively examined the delivery of neurosurgical care in the Philippines, a lower-middle–income country in Southeast Asia with a total population of 109 million. We aimed to quantify the workforce, map the distribution, and characterize the clinical practice of neurosurgeons across the 17 regions and 81 provinces of the Philippines. METHODS: An online survey was sent to all fellows of the Academy of Filipino Neurosurgeons and all graduates of neurosurgical training programs in the country. Neurosurgeons who have been in active clinical practice for at least 1 year were eligible to participate. A database of Filipino neurosurgeons was generated through personal communications, correspondence with neurosurgery departments, and accessing publicly available information. The top neurosurgical procedures were identified to estimate the overall volume of neurosurgical disease. RESULTS: There are 174 neurosurgeons practicing in the Philippines or approximately one neurosurgeon for every 600 000 people. In 9 provinces, neurosurgeons were only available part-time, and 35 provinces had no neurosurgeons at all, equivalent to an underserved population of 24 million people. Among 99 survey respondents, the median numbers of neurosurgical consults and operations every month were 30 (IQR:35) and 8 (IQR:8), respectively. The top neurosurgical procedures were burr holes/craniotomy for traumatic brain injury, craniotomy for stroke, and biopsy/resection of brain tumors. There are an estimated 93 498 cases requiring essential neurosurgery every year. CONCLUSION: Although positive trends have been observed in the number, distribution, and composition of neurosurgeons in the Philippines, there remains a large workforce deficit that needs to be addressed to provide timely, quality, and affordable neurosurgical care to the entire population.

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“…Similar quantitative analyses centered on recruitment patterns in other surgical subspecialties, such as plastic surgery, orthopedic surgery, and otolaryngology, remain warranted. In recognition of the crucial role that women have played in the progress of neurosurgery abroad, including regions such as Asia, Australasia, Latin America, and India, [17][18][19] comparable analyses and data curation efforts must be established internationally.…”

Section: Implications Moving Forwardmentioning

confidence: 99%

Recruitment of women in neurosurgery: a 7-year quantitative analysis

Feghali

Antar

Wicks

et al. 2023

Journal of Neurosurgery

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OBJECTIVE The authors aimed to characterize which US medical schools have the most female neurosurgery residents and to identify potential associations between medical school characteristics and successful recruitment of women pursuing a neurosurgery career. METHODS The authors evaluated a total of 1572 residents in US neurosurgery programs accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education as of February 2021, representing match cohorts from 2014 to 2020. The authors extracted US medical school characteristics and ranked schools based on the percentages of women graduates entering neurosurgery. They additionally studied yearly trends of the percentage of women constituting incoming neurosurgery resident cohorts as well as associations between female recruitment percentage and medical school characteristics using univariable and stepwise multivariable linear regression (including significant univariable factors). RESULTS The cohort consisted of 1255 male and 317 (20%) female residents. Yearly trends indicated a significant drop in incoming female residents in 2016, followed by significant increases in 2017 and 2019. On multivariable analysis, the following factors were associated with a higher average percentage of female graduates entering neurosurgery: total affiliated neurosurgery clinical faculty (β = 0.006, 95% CI 0.001–0.011, p = 0.01), allopathic versus osteopathic schools (β = 0.231, 95% CI 0.053–0.409, p = 0.01), and top 10 U.S. News & World Report ranking (β = 0.380, 95% CI 0.129–0.589, p < 0.01). When the number of female clinical faculty was added to the model, the variable was not statistically significant. Multivariable bibliometric analyses indicated a higher mean preresidency H-index for men, with an even greater gender difference identified in the 2021 H-index. CONCLUSIONS This study characterizes which medical schools are most successful at recruiting female students who constituted the total neurosurgery resident workforce of the 2020–2021 academic year. The overall number of clinical neurosurgery faculty rather than faculty gender was independently associated with female recruitment. Gender differences in research productivity persisted with control for confounders and increased between preresidency and 2021 time points. Such understanding of factors that influence the recruitment of women can help improve female representation in neurosurgery residency training moving forward.

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Progress in neurosurgery: Contributions of women neurosurgeons in Asia and Australasia

Cited by 28 publications

References 9 publications

Neurosurgery as a Career Choice among Recent Medical Graduates from the Institute of Medicine, Nepal: A Cross-sectional Study

Neurosurgery as a Career Choice among Recent Medical Graduates from the Institute of Medicine, Nepal: A Cross-sectional Study

The Neurosurgical Workforce of the Philippines

Recruitment of women in neurosurgery: a 7-year quantitative analysis

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