Abstract
Purpose:
To analyze gender representation across a hierarchy of speaking roles at major international ophthalmology conferences and quantify disparities in high-prestige invited roles vs merit-based submitted roles.
Setting:
Annual meetings of 7 international ophthalmology societies (American Academy of Ophthalmology, ASCRS, ESCRS, United Kingdom & Ireland Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons, Australian Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons, Brazilian Association of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, Irish College of Ophthalmology) from 2019 to 2024.
Design:
Retrospective, cross-sectional study.
Methods:
A total of 40 940 speaker slots were analyzed. Sex was determined using a validated protocol combining API analysis and manual verification. Roles were classified into a 3-tiered hierarchy: tier 1 (high-prestige: named lecturers, keynotes, and awards), tier 2 (invited faculty), and tier 3 (general presenter: submitted papers). Multivariate logistic regression assessed the association between sex and role prestige.
Results:
Women held 5397 (36.6%) of tier 3 (submitted) roles but only 45 (25.6%) of tier 1 (high-prestige) roles. In multivariate analysis adjusted for conference and year, women had significantly lower odds of occupying a high-prestige role compared with a submitted role (adjusted odds ratio, 0.59; 95% CI, 0.42-0.84;
P
= .003). A “glass podium” effect was observed, with women's representation decreasing as role prestige increased.
Conclusions:
Despite robust participation in submitted research, women remain underrepresented in the most visible, career-advancing roles. This disparity supports consideration of more objective and structured approaches to speaker invitation and role allocation in invited conference programming.