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A descriptive analysis of general surgery residency program directors in the United States
Alexa Hughes1, Kyuseok Im1, Junjia Zhu2
1Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey, PA, USA.
Background:
Women remain underrepresented in surgery. We analyzed the demographics of general surgery program directors (PDs) and compared gender differences.
Methods:
A search of online resources was conducted, including 344 general surgery residencies.
Results:
340 residencies were included. 261 PDs (76.8%) were male and 79 (23.2%) were female. Females were appointed at a younger age (p < 0.0001), were appointed sooner after residency (p < 0.0001) and have served similar term lengths compared to males (p = 0.556). There was no difference in academic position, fellowship training, or scholarly output between genders. Residencies with a female PD had a greater percentage of female residents (p = 0.04).
Conclusion:
General surgery PDs are predominately male with fellowship training; however the percentage of female PDs is similar to the percentage of practicing female general surgeons in the US. Gaining a better understanding of the characteristics of general surgery PDs can aid female surgeons in attaining academic leadership positions.
