The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education 20-Year Trends in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the United States: How Does Neurological Surgery Compare?

BACKGROUND: Within the current medical workforce, diversity is limited among surgical specialties. However, diversity allows physicians to provide culturally competent care. This paper discusses the trends in racial, ethnic, and gender representation within different surgical subspecialties with an emphasis on neurosurgery over a 20-year time frame. METHODS: A retrospective review of data collected by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education over the past twenty years, as reported in Journal of the American Medical Association, was conducted. Residents from 5 surgical specialties were evaluated based on gender, race, and ethnic identifications from 2002 to 2022. One-way analysis of variance was performed to compare the levels and retention rates of racial, ethnic, and gender diversity within these specialties. RESULTS: Analysis of resident demographics of the 5 surgical specialties reveals an overall trend of increasing diversity over the study period. Over the past 20 years, neurosurgery had an overall increase in Asian (+5.1%), Hispanic (+3.0%), and female (+11.4%) residents, with a decrease in White residents by 2.1% and Black residents by 1.1%. Among the surgical specialties analyzed, otolaryngology had the greatest overall increase in minority residents. Notably, there has been an overall increase in female residents across all 5 surgical specialties, with the highest in otolaryngology (+20.3%) which was significantly more than neurosurgery (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: This chronological analysis spanning 20 years demonstrates that neurosurgery, like other specialties, has seen a growth in several racial and ethnic categories. Relative differences are notable in neurosurgery, including Black, Asian, Hispanic, and White ethnic categories, with growth in females, but at a significantly lesser pace than seen in otolaryngology and plastic surgery.

Antagonistic L1 Adhesion Molecule Mimetic Compounds Inhibit Glioblastoma Cell Migration In Vitro.

Cell adhesion molecule L1 is a cell surface glycoprotein that promotes neuronal cell migration, fosters regeneration after spinal cord injury and ameliorates the consequences of neuronal degeneration in mouse and zebrafish models. Counter-indicative features of L1 were found in tumor progression: the more L1 is expressed, the more tumor cells migrate and increase their metastatic potential. L1's metastatic potential is further evidenced by its promotion of epithelial-mesenchymal transition, endothelial cell transcytosis and resistance to chemo- and radiotherapy. These unfortunate features are indicated by observations that cells that normally do not express L1 are induced to express it when becoming malignant. With the aim to ameliorate the devastating functions of L1 in tumors, we designed an alternative approach to counteract tumor cell migration. Libraries of small organic compounds were screened using the ELISA competition approach similar to the one that we used for identifying L1 agonistic mimetics. Whereas in the former approach, a function-triggering monoclonal antibody was used for screening libraries, we here used the function-inhibiting monoclonal antibody 324 that reduces the migration of neurons. We now show that the L1 antagonistic mimetics anagrelide, 2-hydroxy-5-fluoropyrimidine and mestranol inhibit the migration of cultured tumor cells in an L1-dependent manner, raising hopes for therapy.