Sex Diversity in Ophthalmology Leadership in 2020 —A Call for Action

It is 2020 —a special year for ophthalmologists and an appropriate time to reflect on the state of our field. In this issue of JAMA Ophthalmology, Camacci and colleagues highlight yet another area where women lag behind men in ophthalmology. Evaluating the sex composition of 15 ophthalmology societies and 20 ophthalmic journals, the authors found that approximately one-quarter of the members of society and editorial boards were women, which seems reasonable when one considers that women make up approximately one-quarter of practicing ophthalmologists in the US. However, a completely different picture e merged for the leadership positions. Only 2 of 15 society presidents (13.3%) were women in 2018, and only 1 of the 20 journals (4.2%) included had a female editor in chief during the time of this study. Granted, these data might change, depending on the societies included and the year the data were acquired, but still, it is clear that there is room for improvement.

Source: JAMA Ophthalmology - May 1, 2020 Category: Opthalmology Source Type: research