Disparities of women’s authorship in Colombia: A cross-sectional analysis

Accepted manuscripts published in medical journals play a crucial role within the scientific community. Over the past few decades, there has been a gradual increase in the number of women entering the medical field. However, women remain underrepresented as first and last authors in medical journals. This lack of representation makes it harder for them to reach leadership roles and advance academically. Even if this has been studied in high-income countries, low- and middle-income countries still lack evidence to prove this fundamental problem. This study aims to do this by investigating the gender distribution among authors and exploring disparities in authorship in Colombia. The analysis encompassed 6,088 articles derived from 54 research journals obtained from the official website of Colombia's Ministry of Health. The journals included enhance the significance of this paper, as they are typically not included in indexed databases. Consequently, their inclusion in gender evaluations has been limited in previous studies. These were predominantly original research articles, although case reports and reviews were also present. Until now, there has been no assessment of gender disparities in authorship within medical and surgical specialty journals in Colombia. The presence of enduring gender differences in medical authorship in Colombia remains evident, independent of the temporal, geographical, or academic domain. Even when factors such as medical specialization and geographic location influenced women's authorship proportions, the gap persisted in all cases. This highlights the critical need for increased support for women researchers and equitable resource allocation to address the specific medical specializations as well as geographical locations that we found were even more affected by these gender disparities. This paper highlights the urgent need to address gender disparities in the authorship of medical and surgical research publications in Colombia and other Latin American countries. Addressing these disparities is a critical step toward assisting women in advancing in an equal and fair medical profession.