Authorship trends in urology literature A bibliometric analysis by gender

The increasing entry of women into urology underscores the need to evaluate academic representation and characterize ongoing disparities within the specialty. This study provides a comprehensive global assessment of gender representation in urologic literature over time by study design, journal type, and geographic region.

All PubMed database abstracts under "Urology"[MeSH] or "Urology" (January 2002 to January 2024) were evaluated. Authorship position, institutional affiliation country, and journal name were extracted. Descriptive statistics and inferential tests were performed to assess gender-based differences in publication characteristics through validated name-to-gender matching tools.

A total of 130 621 publications comprising 885 343 author names were included, of which 21.7% were identified as women. The proportion of women authors increased significantly from 11.4% in 2002 to 26.3% in 2024 (p<0.001). Overall, the number of women in senior authorship positions (14.8%) remains lower than in first-authorship roles (21.6%). The lowest representation of overall women authors was from African institutions (15.3%), whereas the highest was from European institutions (27.3%). Women published less proportionally than men across all study designs, particularly in interventional research (18.5%) and case reports (17.2%). First and senior women authors had higher odds of publishing in predatory journals compared with non-predatory journals (adjusted odds ratio (AOR) 1.18, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.12-1.24; AOR 1.21, 95% CI 1.14-1.28, respectively).

Despite progress, substantial gender disparities persist in authorship in urology research, particularly in senior authorship roles. This global bibliometric analysis highlights the need to better understand the barriers that limit female representation in urologic publications.