Gender influence on career trajectory as a shoulder and elbow surgeon.

Background: Women continue to make up a minority of orthopedic surgeons, especially shoulder and elbow surgeons. There exists no study that investigates the effect of gender on one's academic career as a shoulder and elbow orthopedic surgeon, which was the purpose of this cross-sectional study.

Methods: The American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons website was used to identify surgeons. Demographics, education, and current professional roles were obtained using the websites of institutions, hospital employers, physicians, LinkedIn, and Doximity. Research productivity metrics were obtained using SCOPUS and Google Scholar. Outcome measures included current academic/leadership roles, and research productivity. Statistical analysis was performed using the Chi-squared test and Mann-Whitney U test.

Results: Totally, 893 surgeons were identified, 60 being female (6.7%). Males had a significantly higher average h-index (P = 0.003), total number of publications (P = 0.019), citations (P = 0.03) and ASES membership ranks than female surgeons (P = 0.037; P = 0.004). There were no significant differences between genders in current professional or leadership roles.

Discussion: Female surgeons had a significantly lower number of citations, publications, and h-index but equal leadership positions such as fellowship director, residency director, chief of service, and department chair compared to their male counterparts.

Level of evidence: Level III, cross-sectional study.