Women Neurosurgeons in Academic and Other Leadership Positions in the United States

Feng, Rui; Hoffman, Samantha E.; Wagner, Katherine; Ullman, Jamie S.; Stippler, Martina; Germano, Isabelle M.

doi:10.1016/j.wneu.2020.12.069

Cited by 23 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…This finding is not isolated to editorial boards; previous studies have also documented significantly higher rates of female faculty neurosurgeons possessing additional graduate degrees. 17 However, it is difficult to determine if this trend remains true of female neurosurgical applicants and neurosurgery residents, as no studies have been performed as of yet.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…[14][15][16] Furthermore, of the females serving as faculty members, they are more likely to hold advanced degrees than their male counterparts. 17 In addition, most neurosurgery departments only have a small minority of females in leadership positions and even fewer females serving as department chairs. 14,16 This trend in female leadership is also true in neurosurgical societies as fewer than 30% of US state neurosurgical society presidents were female.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…14,16 This trend in female leadership is also true in neurosurgical societies as fewer than 30% of US state neurosurgical society presidents were female. 17 These studies have uncovered some of the barriers that females face in neurosurgery, academia, and leadership; however, much remains unknown regarding the difficulties encountered by females in this field. To further establish the climate and gender disparities experienced by female neurosurgeons, we investigated the presence of females on neurosurgery journal editorial boards, an additional proxy for leadership opportunities afforded to medical professionals.…”

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confidence: 99%

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A step toward equal representation? A cross-sectional analysis of the gender composition of neurosurgical editorial boards from 2000 to 2020

Bauman

Wang

Bhandarkar

et al. 2022

Journal of Neurosurgery

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OBJECTIVE At present, females constitute less than 10% of neurosurgeons in the US, despite representing approximately half of all medical students. Multiple barriers have been described for females entering the neurosurgical field, particularly academic neurosurgery. Understanding the environment that female neurosurgeons face and any potential barriers preventing career advancement is needed to recruit, promote, and retain females in neurosurgery. METHODS The gender composition of editorial boards for 5 high-impact neurosurgery journals was analyzed from 2000 to 2020. The names of editorial board members were obtained directly from the journal administration, physical copies of the published journal, or publicly available data through each journal’s website. The gender, degrees, academic titles, H-index, and country were determined for each individual and statistical tests were performed to identify significant differences. RESULTS Of the 466 identified individuals that served on at least one editorial board between 2000 and 2020, there were 36 females (7.7%) and 430 males (92.3%). There were no significant differences between males and females serving on multiple editorial boards. Most females possessed an additional graduate degree (58.3%), while only one-third of males (33.5%) obtained such a degree (p = 0.002). In addition, males had significantly higher average H-indices than females (p = 0.002). These trends were also observed when analyzing only US-based editorial board members. Although females were more likely overall to be identified as associate professors, males were more likely to be appointed as full professors (p = 0.001); this trend did not remain true in the US-based cohort. When analyzing the editorial boards for individual journals, all 5 journals experienced an increase of female representation since 2000 or since their inception after 2000. The highest proportion of females for a single journal was 27.3% in 2020. All other journals ranged from 11.0% to 13.5% in 2020. CONCLUSIONS When entering the field of neurosurgery, females continue to face significant social and academic barriers. While the proportion of females on editorial boards for neurosurgery journals in 2020 is consistent with the proportion of practicing female neurosurgeons, there is a statistically significantly higher likelihood that females possess additional graduate degrees and lower H-indices compared to their male counterparts. The authors encourage neurosurgical journals to continue expanding female representation on editorial boards.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

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A step toward equal representation? A cross-sectional analysis of the gender composition of neurosurgical editorial boards from 2000 to 2020

Bauman

Wang

Bhandarkar

et al. 2022

Journal of Neurosurgery

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“…2,6 Although there are many postulated theories about the cause of women's underrepresentation in NS, addressing the gender gap might also contribute to increased recruitment of underrepresented minorities. 23 The lack of a significant association between a large faculty size and a higher URiM NSF representation highlights the need for enhanced and prioritized diversity efforts across all programs. Furthermore, the lack of a single URiM faculty in almost one-third of the NSRP and the absence of URiM NSF at 25 of the 33 NSRP with a faculty size >10 illustrate that a significant racial diversity gap in NS still exists.…”

Section: Current Racial Diversity Within the Nsf Workforcementioning

confidence: 99%

Racial and Ethnical Diversity Within the Neurosurgery Resident and Faculty Workforce in the United States

et al. 2022

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BACKGROUND: Promoting workplace diversity leads to a variety of benefits related to a broader range of perspectives and insights. Underrepresented in medicine (URiM), including African Americans, Latinx, and Natives (Americans/Alaskan/Hawaiians/Pacific Islanders), are currently accounting for approximately 40% of the US population. OBJECTIVE: To establish a snapshot of current URiM representation within academic neurosurgery (NS) programs and trends within NS residency. METHODS: All 115 NS residencies and academic programs accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education in 2020 were included in this study. The National Residency Matching Program database was reviewed from 2011 to 2020 to analyze URiM representation trends over time within the NS resident workforce. The academic rank, academic and clinical title(s), subspecialty, sex, and race of URiM NS faculty (NSF) were obtained from publicly available data. RESULTS: The Black and Latinx NS resident workforce currently accounts for 4.8% and 5.8% of the total workforce, respectively. URiM NSF are present in 71% of the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education-accredited NS programs and account for 8% (148 of 1776) of the workforce. Black and Latinx women comprise 10% of URiM NSF. Latinx NSFs are the majority within the URiM cohort for both men and women. URiM comprise 5% of all department chairs. All are men. Spine (26%), tumor (26%), and trauma (17%) were the top 3 subspecialties among URiM NSF. CONCLUSION: NS has evolved, expanded, and diversified in numerous directions, including race and gender representation. Our data show that ample opportunities remain to improve URiM representation within NS.

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“…This disparity is furthered by the lack of women in leadership roles within our field; as of 2020, only 4 women have served as chair of neurosurgical departments at United States medical schools, and women neurosurgeons have held just 1% of officer positions within the top 7 United States neurosurgery organizations in their 89-yr history. 15 We sought to analyze LOR for neurosurgery applicants to determine if there were any gendered differences that have been seen in other specialties that may be reflective of a wider issue of implicit bias in residency selection.…”

Section: Ranking Just Behind United States Medical Licensing Examinat...mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Gender in Neurosurgical Residency Applicants’ Letters of Recommendation

Field¹,

Pilitsis²,

Paúl³

2021

Neurosurg.

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BACKGROUND Letters of recommendation (LORs) are one of the most important components of the neurosurgical residency application. Studies in other fields and surgical subspecialties have found gender bias. OBJECTIVE To determine whether neurosurgical LORs contain significant linguistic gendered differences. METHODS We performed a retrospective review and linguistic analysis of all LORs submitted on behalf of applicants offered an interview invitation to a single neurosurgical residency program at an academic medical center between 2015-2016 and 2018-2019. RESULTS A total of 599 letters from 156 applicants (120 males and 36 females) were included. Background demographics, including United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) Step 1 score and publications, were not significantly different between applicants. Male faculty authored 93% of all letters. Female faculty were more likely to write letters for female applicants than male applicants (12.1% vs 5.5%, P < .001). Letters for women were significantly longer (334 words vs 277 words, P < .001). Overall, 1754 agentic terms and 854 communal terms were coded. Letters for men contained significantly fewer agentic terms (10.7 vs 13.1, per applicant, P < .01) and communal terms (5.2 vs 6.4, P < .034). This difference, however, is nonsignificant when word count was used as a covariate. Female applicants were more significantly likely to be labeled “Outstanding” (2.4 vs 1.6 mentions per applicant). CONCLUSION Overall, there are more similarities than differences between genders in LORs for neurosurgical applicants. This finding is at odds with what has previously been reported in most other surgical specialties.

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Women Neurosurgeons in Academic and Other Leadership Positions in the United States

Cited by 23 publications

References 7 publications

A step toward equal representation? A cross-sectional analysis of the gender composition of neurosurgical editorial boards from 2000 to 2020

A step toward equal representation? A cross-sectional analysis of the gender composition of neurosurgical editorial boards from 2000 to 2020

Racial and Ethnical Diversity Within the Neurosurgery Resident and Faculty Workforce in the United States

The Role of Gender in Neurosurgical Residency Applicants’ Letters of Recommendation

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