The physician workforce has struggled to improve Black representation among academic ranks over the past 30 years, and radiology is near the bottom of the list, according to new research.
Less than 2% of U.S. medical school faculty in imaging self-identified as Black or African American in 1990, and by 2020, the number had climbed to 2.31%. This 0.32 absolute percentage-point change placed radiology at the bottom of the list among 16 specialties, tied with emergency medicine, experts detailed Tuesday in JAMA.
“The proportion of U.S. medical school faculty who self-identified as Black or African American increased only minimally from 1990 to 2020. No specialty had proportions comparable with current US population estimates (13.4%),” Christopher Bennett, MD, and Albee Ling, PhD, with the Stanford School of Medicine, wrote Aug. 17.
For their research letter, the authors queried the Association of American Medical Colleges Faculty Roster, which reports the annual number of full-time faculty at U.S. medical schools. Data showed an overall increase in the number of such positions from 58,561 in 1990 up to 157,816 by last year. At the same time, self-reporting of multiple races by faculty jumped from 1.49% up to 4.46%
By 2020, less than 5% of faculty in 14 different specialties self-reported as being Black or African American. Obstetrics and gynecology recorded the highest mark at 8.5%, and otolaryngology the lowest at 1.96%. Radiology started with 93 Black medical school faculty in 1990, increasing to 228 by 2020.
“Study limitations include that self-reporting of multiple races by faculty increased over time. Even if this contributed to the increase in Black or African American faculty, the inadequacy of representation to date is still evident,” the authors advised.
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.