Gender disparity among top North American medical schools and their affiliated radiology departments: Medical school vs Radiology - Gender Diverse?

Purpose: This study aimed to evaluate the degree of gender disparity in leadership positions at the top 25 medical schools in North America compared to their affiliated radiology departments.

Methods: The academic rank and leadership appointment of medical school and radiology faculty were obtained from publicly available official websites between June-November 2022. Gender was determined using self-identified pronouns on website biographies. Alternatively, gender API software was used. Finally, SCOPUS Elsevier was used to extract research output metrics including publication counts, citations, and h-indices. Statistical analysis was conducted using the IBM SPSS Statistics version 25 software.

Results: 2216 individuals across 25 medical schools were included in this study. 1301 (58.7 %) were part of the medical school and 915 (41.3 %) were part of the affiliated radiology departments. Additionally, 1575 (71.1 %) were identified as men and 641 (28.9 %) as women. Rank biserial correlations showed a significant association between higher academic rank and male gender (r = 0.143, p < 0.001) regardless of affiliation (medical school leadership versus radiology faculty); this disparity was largest at the highest academic ranks. Male gender was associated with higher research productivity relative to female gender regardless of affiliation (p < 0.001). There were minimal statistical differences in leadership positions between genders, however the proportion of men holding the position of dean was two times higher than women.

Conclusion: The underrepresentation of women in academic medicine is prevalent in the top-ranking medical institutions in North America and disproportionately involves senior academic ranks and leadership positions.