MP75-19: Characteristics of Male and Female Applicants who Successfully Matched into Urology Residency Programs: Analysis of the 2016-2021 Urology Resident Cohort
Introduction: Urology has been long recognized as a competitive field, and women have historically remained underrepresented. However, over the last 3 years, the female match rate has exceeded the overall match rate. We undertook this purely descriptive study without causal assumptions to assess differences in the characteristics of male and female urology residents at the time of their match. Methods: Using publicly available data, demographics and bibliometrics were collected for 1,814 urology residents who attend a US-based ACGME-Accredited program, reflecting matched applicants from 2016-2021. Sex was determined via a combination of resident name, photo, and social media profile, and then compared to the official match statistics compiled by the American Urological Association. Pearson’s chi-squared test and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used to test for associations. Results: Of 1,814 successfully matched residents, 1,297 (71.5%) were male and 516 (28.5%) were female (Table 1). There were no significant differences between male and female applicants with respect to the most higher educational degrees, except for a higher proportion of females having a Masters of Science compared to males (11.43% vs 8.17%, p = 0.029). No significant differences in AOA memberships between males and females were observed (20.66% vs 21.32%, p < 0.757). Regarding bibliometrics, male residents had a higher mean number of published papers and abstracts compared to their female counterparts (5.9 vs 4.7, p < 0.001) as well as a higher h-index (2.1 vs 1.7, p = 0.001). Data on research output was similar post-match as of 2021. Conclusions: As we seek to close the sex/gender gap in our field, it is critical to understand the characteristics of successful match applicants and to identify and address pre-existing disparities responsible for this gap. Though we found research output and select higher educational degrees varied according to sex of the applicant, these findings are not easily interpretable. Further research is needed to explore other variables not evaluable using publicly available data (i.e. degree and availability of mentorship and resources available to male vs female applicants, etc.). SOURCE OF Funding: This work is supported by a grant from the National Cancer Institute (P30CA072720)
.jpg "Juliana Eunyoung Kim, BS (she/her/hers) photo")
