Speaking Up and Speaking Out: Gender Diversity in the Scientific Programme of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons Annual Scientific Congress.

Background: Disparities in gender representation at medical meetings have been documented despite women representing half of medical school graduating classes. Lack of role models is touted as one of a myriad of factors that perpetuate gender imbalance, particularly in the field of surgery. We evaluated the trend in gender distribution of participants at the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS) Annual Scientific Congress (ASC) and whether there was a correlation between the gender distribution of the organising committee and speakers and chairpersons invited to attend.

Gender Representation by Specialty Track at Surgical Meetings: The American and Australasian Experiences.

Background: We compared the representation of women panelists at two large, general interest surgical meetings: the American College of Surgeons (ACS) Clinical Congress and Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS) Scientific Congress.

Materials And Methods: We performed comprehensive analyses of panels and panelists at ACS and RACS meetings (2013-2018). Manual review was conducted to determine counts and proportions of invited panelists by gender.