Impact of Surgeon Gender and Seniority in use of Agentic and Communal Language in Letters of Recommendation for Surgery Residency Applicants.

Objective: Differential use of communal (kindness, cooperation, morality) and agentic terms (competence, assertiveness, decisiveness) may reveal bias and has been extensively reported in letters of recommendation (LoR) for residency but letter writer factors have not been thoroughly studied. We estimate the association between use of agentic and communal language with letter writer and applicant characteristics.

Design: Retrospective review of LoR comparing 2 letters written for the same applicant.

Pilot Gene Expression and Histopathologic Analysis of Tracheal Resections in Tracheobronchomalacia.

Background: The airway structures and messenger RNA expression of genes that regulate airway inflammation and remodeling may be altered in the trachea of patients with tracheobronchomalacia (TBM).

Methods: Fourteen tracheal specimens obtained from 2005 to 2018 were used in this study. Surgical resection specimens from patients with TBM and tracheal stenosis (TS) were compared with control tracheal specimens obtained from autopsy cases.