Diversity presentations at cardiothoracic surgery meetings: Opportunity to align our actions with our values

Substantial efforts have been directed toward identifying and addressing cardiothoracic surgical disparities in both patient care and our workforce. We aimed to characterize the presence over time of diversity and disparities-related content at cardiothoracic surgical society meetings.

Annual meeting program books from the American Association for Thoracic Surgery and the Society of Thoracic Surgeons from 2013 to 2023 were manually reviewed to identify abstract presentations, invited talks, and dedicated sessions related to diversity, equity, or social determinants of health. Relevant presentations were further categorized as issues in the surgical workforce versus patient care. Applicable presentations and sessions were quantified in each domain and proportions compared with the χ² test.

Of 7812 presentations over 11 years, 167 (2.1%) were related to issues of diversity. These included 118 abstracts, among which 19 (16.1%) covered workforce diversity issues whereas 99 (83.9%) addressed patient care inequities. Among 48 invited disparities talks, 28 (58.3%) related to workforce challenges and 20 (41.7%) explored variabilities in patient care. Seventeen complete sessions were dedicated to diversity and disparities, with 9 (52.9%) addressing those in the workforce and 8 (47.1%) related to patient care. Comparing the first 5 years with the final 5 years of study, the proportion of talks (abstracts and invited) related to diversity and inclusion increased 3-fold.

Recent years have shown an explosion in cardiothoracic surgery meeting content focused on diversity but still account for a diminutive proportion of overall content. These data highlight an opportunity to further align scholarly activity with our values.