Diversity in Radiology Residents Relative to Other Specialties- Trends Over the Past Decade

Xiao Wu; Mihir Khunte; Suryansh Bajaj; Priyanka Prajapati; Seyedmehdi Payabvash; Max Wintermark; Dheeraj Gandhi; Ajay Malhotra

doi:10.1016/j.acra.2023.07.020

Diversity in Radiology Residents Relative to Other Specialties- Trends Over the Past Decade

Acad Radiol. 2023 Nov;30(11):2736-2740. doi: 10.1016/j.acra.2023.07.020. Epub 2023 Sep 23.

Authors

Xiao Wu¹, Mihir Khunte², Suryansh Bajaj², Priyanka Prajapati², Seyedmehdi Payabvash², Max Wintermark³, Dheeraj Gandhi⁴, Ajay Malhotra⁵

Affiliations

¹ Department of Radiology, University of California at San Francisco, San Francisco, CA.
² Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT.
³ Department of Neuroradiology, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas.
⁴ Interventional Neuroradiology, Nuclear Medicine, Neurology and Neurosurgery, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD.
⁵ Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT. Electronic address: ajay.malhotra@yale.edu.

PMID: 37748955
DOI: 10.1016/j.acra.2023.07.020

Abstract

Rationale and objectives: The objective of this study was to assess diversity among radiology residents relative to other specialties and compare it with historical trends.

Materials and methods: The Graduate Medical Education results from 2010-2011 to 2020-2021 were accessed for demographic information for major medical specialties (number of residents > 500 as of the 2020-2021 report). Subspecialties and fellowship programs were not included in this analysis. The racial and ethnicity breakdowns were extracted, including Black, White/Caucasian, Asian, Hispanic, and others. The changes in racial and ethnicity composition of residents in radiology was compared to other specialties using the Chi Squared test using a significance level of p < 0.05.

Results: In 2020-2021, radiology ranked ninth in total resident enrollment among the 21 largest ACGME training programs, unchanged when compared to 2010-2011. Amongst all specialties, Radiology ranked 10th for Black and 9th for Hispanic representation in 2020-2021.The percentage of Black residents increased from 3.07% in 2010-2011 to 3.83% in 2020-2021. The percentage of Hispanic Radiology residents increased from 4.83% to 7.35%, constituting the third largest increase amongst all specialties.

Conclusion: The representation of Blacks and Hispanics in Radiology has improved relative to other medical specialties in the last decade.

Keywords: Diversity; Radiology; Trends.