S0947 Women Authorship in Advanced Endoscopy: An Impetus for Further Participation

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: While the number of women in the field of gastroenterology has been steadily increasing, the discrepancy between women and men pursuing advanced endoscopy remains significant. We therefore aimed to illustrate the prevalence of female authorship in the last decade as it pertains to the field of advanced endoscopy (AE). METHODS: We reviewed all articles in the realm of advanced endoscopy that appeared in seven gastroenterology journals (Nature reviews Gastroenterology & Hepatology, Gastroenterology, Gut, The Lancet Gastroenterology & Hepatology, Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, The American Journal of Gastroenterology, and Gastrointestinal Endoscopy) for the years 2008 and 2018. These journals were selected as the most impactful journals (impact factor [IF] > 6 [2018 ranking, Journal Citation Reports, Clarivate Analytics, London, UK]) that publish articles related to AE. We collected information on authorship (first, corresponding), sex of author, country of author’s institution and subspecialty. Only original research or reviews were collected, and article type was classified as original clinical studies/reviews or original translational studies/reviews. RESULTS: A total of 6,325 articles were surveyed and 276 articles were included in our final cohort as shown in Table 1. Sixty-six (24%) publications had a woman as the first author, while the majority (n = 209, 76%) had a man as first author (Table 1). Even more profoundly, men primarily held corresponding authorship compared to women (90.3% vs. 9.74%). The number of women as first authors increased from 19.4% (n = 28/144) in 2008 to 29.0% (n = 38/131) in 2018 (P = 0.06) [Figure 1]. In this time period, there was a statistically significant increase in women as corresponding author from 6.4% (n = 9/141) to 13.5% (n = 17/126), P = 0.05. For clinical research and reviews, there was a significant increase in women with first authorship (P = 0.04, see Table 2); women as corresponding authors also increased, but this did not reach statistical significance (P = 0.08). CONCLUSION: In the last decade, there has been an increase in women as first and corresponding authors in AE research. This is primarily due to a proliferation of female authorship in original clinical research and reviews. This data suggests efforts to expand women representation in AE have been effective; continued mentorship of women gastroenterologists and advanced endoscopists early in their career is warranted.Table 1.: Summary of the overall population and comparison of article characteristics between 2008 and 2018. Categorical variables are summarized with frequencies and percentages while continuous variables are summarized with medians and interquartile ranges (IQR). P-values are from chi-squared tests unless otherwise noted. 1 Among clinical studies 2 Wilcoxon rank sum testTable 2.: Summary of the overall population of clinical versus translational articles and comparison of author sex between 2008 and 2018. 1 Chi-square test 2 Fisher exact testFigure 1.: Proportion of women as first or corresponding authors in 2008 versus 2018.