Transplant departments lack gender, racial diversity in leadership
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After reviewing a database of kidney transplant department chiefs, researchers found women, especially those who were not white, were underrepresented.
The findings were presented at the virtual American Society of Transplant Surgeons Winter Symposium.
According to Ankur P. Choubey, a fourth-year medical student at the University of Toledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences, and colleagues, although more women than men entered medical school in 2017, there remains a disparity in the representation of women in academic surgery.
“Women are less likely to attain and remain in senior academic ranks,” the researchers wrote in a poster abstract. “After adjusting for publication rates, women continue to hold fewer senior positions. There is a paucity of research on the diversity of transplant department leadership.”
To fill in this gap, Choubey and colleagues curated a database of kidney transplant department chiefs and conducted internet searches for related demographics (eg, education, training, gender, race and academic appointment).
They found women were department chiefs at 9.2% of 195 kidney transplant programs. An assessment race showed 67% of female chiefs were non-Hispanic white, 27% were Asian and 6% were Hispanic. There were not any African American department chiefs.
“Female leadership as kidney chiefs ... lags behind female membership in [the] transplant workforce,” the researchers concluded. “Interventions are necessary to improve representation of underrepresented minority women in transplant leadership.”
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Choubey AP, et al. Poster 71. Presented at: ASTS Winter Symposium. Jan. 14-16, 2021 (virtual meeting).
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