Increases in female academic productivity and female mentorship highlight sustained progress in previously identified neurosurgical gender disparities

Abstract

OBJECTIVEA meta-analysis was performed to understand disparities in the representation of female authorship within the neurosurgical literature and implications for career advancement of women in neurosurgery.METHODSAuthor names for articles published in 16 of the top neurosurgical journals from 2002 to 2019 were obtained from MEDLINE. The gender of each author was determined using automated prediction methods. Publication trends were compared over time and across subdisciplines. Female authorship was also compared to the proportionate composition of women in the field over time.RESULTSThe metadata obtained from 16 major neurosurgical journals yielded 66,546 research articles. Gender was successfully determined for 96% (127,809/133,578) of first and senior authors, while the remainder (3.9%) were unable to be determined through prediction methods. Across all years, 13.3% (8826) of articles had female first authorship and 9.1% (6073) had female senior authorship. Female first authorship increased significantly over time from 5.8% in 2002 to 17.2% in 2019 (p < 0.001). Female senior authorship also increased significantly over time, from 5.5% in 2002 to 12.0% in 2019 (p < 0.001). The journals with the highest proportions of female first authors and senior authors were the Journal of Neurosurgery: Pediatrics (33.5%) and the Asian Journal of Neurosurgery (23.8%), respectively. Operative Neurosurgery had the lowest fraction of female first (12.4%) and senior (4.7%) authors. There was a significant difference between the year-by-year proportion of female neurosurgical trainees and the year-by-year proportion of female neurosurgical first (p < 0.001) and senior (p < 0.001) authors. Articles were also more likely to have a female first author if the senior author of the article was female (OR 2.69, CI 2.52–2.86; p < 0.001). From 1944 to 2019, the Journal of Neurosurgery showed a steady increase in female first and senior authorship, with a plateau beginning in the 1990s.CONCLUSIONSLarge meta-analysis techniques have the potential to effectively leverage large amounts of bibliometric data to quantify the representation of female authorship in the neurosurgical literature. The proportion of female authors in major neurosurgical journals has steadily increased. However, the rate of increase in female senior authorship has lagged behind the rate of increase in first authorship, indicating a disparity in academic advancement in women in neurosurgery.

Women in Neurosurgery: Historical Path to Self-Segregation and Proposal for an Integrated Future

“…Based on their professional value, the contribution of female neurosurgeons should be fully integrated in the scientific program of each conference; professionalism and merit are the only features that should attract attention. Young neurosurgeons of both genders living in low-and middle-income countries should be equally supported through scholarships in order to have access to scientific events The importance of mentorship has been highlighted (26,27,(55)(56)(57); in this regard, women in leadership positions, aware of the difficulties that young females in their early career may experience, might be particularly committed to offer guidance to young professionals and help them to fully express their potential.…”

Letter to the Editor. Gender equity in academic neurosurgery: the fight must go on

“…However, the rate of female senior authorship has lagged behind the rate of first authorship, indicating a disparity in academic advancement for women in neurosurgery. 1 We thank Taha et al 1 for providing this information. We highlight the authors' evaluation of first and senior female authorship separately.…”

“…TO THE EDITOR: We read with great interest the article by Taha et al 1 (Taha B, Sadda P, Winston G, et al Increases in female academic productivity and female mentorship highlight sustained progress in previously identified neurosurgical gender disparities. Neurosurg Focus.…”

“…In the same way, the authors emphasize the importance of conducting more research on the review process used by journal editors, to know if anonymity is really maintained or if the deficiencies in this aspect of the process could be associated with gender preferences at the time of acceptance of publications, which has not been estimated so far. 1 In a brief report that evaluated the Association of American Medical Colleges data from 1969 to 2018 to compare the level of female academic faculty representation for surgical specialties over the past 4 decades, it was found that the percentage of women in surgery for all specialties increased (OR 1.04, p < 0.001), but compared with general surgery, the yearly rate of percentage change increased more slowly in neurosurgery (OR 0.84, p = 0.004). 2 The authors comment that the barriers associated with a lower rate of women in surgical specialties are gender stereotyping, lack of female mentors in surgery, and perceived poor work-life balance due to the fact that surgical specialties require a less flexible schedule that involves a greater amount of time.…”

“…Ariana Alejandra Chacón-Aponte, MS 1 Erika Andrea Durán-Vargas, MS 1 Ivan David Lozada-Martínez, MS [2][3][4] Yelson Alejandro Picón-Jaimes, MD 2 Luis Rafael Moscote-Salazar, MD…”