Abstract
Purpose
Grand rounds are an opportunity for invited or internal speakers to disseminate clinical knowledge and research. Prior research has shown that the percentage of female grand rounds speakers across departments has traditionally been lower than the female proportion of faculty and trainees. This study aims to characterize trends and relationships between grand rounds presentation topics and speaker demographics.
Methods
General surgery grand rounds presentations between 2016 and 2021 at our institution were reviewed. For each presentation, speaker gender and institution were coded. Three reviewers performed a content analysis of topics by developing subcategories and collapsing these into larger categories upon final review.
Results
Of the 177 speakers reviewed from 2016 to 2020, 21.47% were females (n = 44), which was not significantly different from the percentage of female faculty (p value = 0.373). The most common topics were “Basic,
Translational, and Clinical Research” (n = 44, 24.8%), and “Care of Specific Conditions” (n = 42, 23.7%). The categories with the largest percentage of female speakers were “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI)” (57%) and “Global and Population Health” (60%). When dichotomizing presentation topics into DEI vs. non-DEI, chi-squared analysis demonstrated a significant association between gender and whether the presentation was on DEI (Chi squared = 1.236, df = 1, p value = 0.266).
Conclusions
In this single-institution analysis, there is a statistically significant difference between the number of female speakers and male speakers who discuss diversity, equity, and inclusion. This study demonstrates the need for improved representation of female speakers on non-DEI topics.
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Data availability
Data are available on request due to privacy or other restrictions.
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Biswas, S., Stauffer, T., Grant, C. et al. A qualitative content analysis of general surgery grand rounds speaker demographics and topics of presentation. Global Surg Educ 2, 67 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s44186-023-00124-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s44186-023-00124-6