Who Resembles a Scientific Leader-Jack or Jill? How Implicit Bias Could Influence Research Grant Funding.

Abstract

When women advance in medicine, so does women’s health. In cardiology, women have led major research studies examining and confirming sex differences in cardiovascular disease risk factors, manifestations, and outcomes, providing essential data for evidence-based approaches to women’s heart health. The inclusion of women in cardiovascular research studies paralleled the entry of women physicians into cardiology. When women were absent as principal investigators, women were also missing from the tens of thousands of participants in the early cardiovascular prevention trials, including the Coronary Drug Project, Physicians Health Study, Lipid Research Clinics Coronary Primary Prevention Trial, and Multiple Risk Factors Intervention Trial (so-called MR FIT). Given the association between women entering cardiology and research in women’s heart health, it is worrisome that women comprise <20% of cardiologists (the lowest percentage among internal medicine subspecialties).1 Furthermore, although female cardiologists are more likely than their male peers to practice in academic settings where most research is conducted (43% versus 34%), they are less likely in these settings to be involved in research2 or achieve the rank of full professor,1 and more likely to report lower levels of career attainment.2 Because conducting research as an independent investigator is …