Sex Disparities in Authorship Order of Cardiology Scientific Publications

Abstract

Background: Despite advances in the representation of women in medical training, women continue to be underrepresented in cardiology, academic medicine, and more specifically, in senior positions within academic medicine. Identifying disparities in research productivity and acknowledgment can highlight barriers to female representation in academic cardiology leadership, as well as in academic promotion.

Methods and results: This bibliometric analysis included all authors of original research articles between 1980 and 2017 from 3 high-impact cardiology journals ( Journal of the American College of Cardiology, Circulation, and European Heart Journal). We identified 71 345 unique authors of 55 085 primary research articles during our study period. Female authors accounted for 33.1% of all authors; however, they represented only 26.7% of first authors and 19.7% of senior authors. Looking at the most prolific authors within this time period, female authors were not well represented, accounting for only 5% of the top 100 authors. Articles with a female senior author had more female middle authors than articles with a male senior author (mean 1.41 versus 0.97, P<0.001) and were more likely to have a female first author (0.37 versus 0.18, P<0.001). There was an increased representation of female authors as first and senior authors compared with the total number of articles with female authors over time ( P<0.001 for trend); however, female senior authorship rates continued to lag first authorship rates.

Conclusions: Using a large database of published manuscripts, we found that female representation in published cardiology research has increased over the past 4 decades. However, women continue to be not well represented as first authors, senior authors, and in the number of publications. When women were senior authors, they published more articles with female first authors and had more female authors. In addition to recruiting more women into the field of cardiology, additional work is needed to identify and address barriers to academic advancement for female physician-scientists.

Keywords: authorship; female; male; publications; research.