Current Workforce Status of the Neurosurgery Societies Belonging to the Latin American Federation of Neurosurgical Societies: A Survey of the Presidents of These Neurosurgery Societies.

Background: The Latin American Federation of Neurosurgical Societies (FLANC) is a nongovernmental, nonprofit civil association, founded to promote neurosurgery in the Latin American countries. The American College of Surgeons and American Association of Neurological Surgeons has recommended a ratio of 1 neurosurgeon/100,000 inhabitants. We aimed to estimate the neurosurgical workforce of the FLANC in 2020.

Methods: We performed an internet-based survey of the presidents of the societies of the FLANC to obtain the neurosurgical workforce characteristics and demographics in their countries. We coded and blindly analyzed the information for dispersion measures and graphics using SPSS, version 25, and Microsoft Excel for map density building. We obtained ratios for the number of neurosurgeons/100,000 inhabitants and the inverse ratio (the number of inhabitants/1 neurosurgeon).

Results: We obtained information from 19 countries. The population totaled 650,008,765 inhabitants. The workforce included 9100 neurosurgeons for a composite within the FLANC of 1.4 neurosurgeons/100,000 inhabitants. The mean ratio among individual countries was 1.17, with as many as 9 countries having a ratio of <1 neurosurgeon/100,000 inhabitants. The proportion of female neurosurgeons in the FLANC was 9.54%. Seven countries had no neurosurgeons in a range of subspecialty fields.

Conclusions: The FLANC has significant disparities in neurosurgical workforce ratios among the member countries. Central American countries probably have the greatest needs. Gender equity should also be improved among the training institutions. We encourage readers to develop future research into the local geographical distribution of neurosurgeons among the countries to better understand their needs and barriers to providing high-quality standards of care.