Abstract WMP86: Persistent Gender and Racial Disparities Among Neurology Residents and Vascular Neurology Fellows Over the Past 10 Years

Abstract

Introduction: Women and minorities are underrepresented in academic medicine. There is little in the literature about gender and racial disparities among neurology or vascular neurology trainees. At the International Stroke Conference, women overall and women physicians have been underrepresented as invited speakers and abstract first authors, and there is recent momentum for improvement. Methods: Data were collected from the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education public website. Dataset included neurology resident and vascular neurology fellow gender data from 2007 to 2017 and race data from 2011 to 2017. Data were analyzed by chi-square test and one-sample proportion test. Results: From 2007-2017, women represented 45% of all neurology trainees and only 33% of all vascular neurology fellows, both significantly lower than 50% (p<0.0001). There was no trend in the proportion of gender by year for vascular fellows (p=0.11) or neurology trainees (p=0.39). However, each year, except for 2012-2013 and 2015-2016 for vascular fellows, varied significantly by gender where men represented the largest proportion. Race varied by year for vascular fellows (p=0.03) and neurology trainees (p=0.017). Blacks and Hispanics represented the lowest proportions and Whites represented the highest proportion of both vascular and neurology trainees. When comparing Whites vs Non-Whites for both fellows (43% vs 57%; p=0.76) and residents (50% vs 50%; p=0.14), there was no trend in the proportions by year. Conclusions: Women, Black and Hispanic physicians remain underrepresented as vascular neurology trainees. The low representation of women and underrepresented minorities has not changed in the last decade. Addressing gender and racial disparities among trainees should be a high national priority for future medical and scientific contributions from these groups.