The number of women sitting on panels at American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meetings has increased in recent years, according to a study published in JNCI Cancer Spectrum.
However, the study also showed that all-male panels — or “manels” — still exist at ASCO Annual Meetings, and women remain underrepresented on panels for sessions about genitourinary cancers and translational/preclinical research.
For this study, researchers evaluated 670 panels at ASCO Annual Meetings from 2018 to 2021. Overall, 47.7% of panelists were women (1181/2475).
Continue Reading
The proportion of women panelists increased from 41.6% in 2018 to 54.0% in 2021 (P <.001). There was a nonsignificant increase in the proportion of women chairs/moderators from 46.8% in 2018 to 54.8% in 2021 (P =.157).
Female Representation by Panel Type
There were significant increases in the proportion of women on panels for:
- Medical oncology sessions, from 42.3% in 2018 to 52.8% in 2021 (P =.003)
- Radiation oncology sessions, from 31.8% to 61.5% (P =.008)
- Leadership/special sessions, from 28.6% to 67.9% (P =.001)
- Educational sessions, from 38.4% to 53.6% (P <.001).
There was no significant change in female representation on panels for scientific sessions, but the proportion of women on scientific panels increased numerically from 48.8% in 2018 to 52.7% in 2021 (P =.463).
Throughout the period studied, women remained underrepresented on panels for sessions about genitourinary cancers and translational/preclinical research. The proportion of women on translational/preclinical panels was 27.4% in 2018 and 41.8% in 2021 (P =.031). The proportion of women on genitourinary cancer panels was 41.1% in 2018 and 40.7% in 2021 (P =.969).
Manels on the Decline
Overall, 12.1% of panels (n=81) were manels. The highest proportion of manels was seen for leadership/special sessions (17.1%) and sessions on translational/preclinical research (19.6%). The lowest proportion of manels was seen for scientific sessions (4.2%) and supportive oncology sessions (2.8%).
The overall proportion of manels decreased from 17.4% in 2018 to 9.9% in 2021 (P =.030). The proportion of manels for educational sessions decreased from 22.2% to 12.9% (P =.037), and the proportion of manels for leadership/special sessions decreased from 25.0% to 0% (P =.057).
The researchers noted that all-female panels existed as well. The proportion of all-female panels was 6.3% in 2018, 5.8% in 2019, 12.7% in 2020, and 12.6% in 2021.
“[T]he number of invited women panelists increased during the study period, with a subsequent decrease in the proportion of manels,” the researchers wrote. “We applaud ASCO for striving for gender parity among invited panelists, although there are certain topics/specialties where representation of women has remained stagnant. In addition, the proportion of manels has not improved further from 10% since 2019.”
Reference
Kamran SC, Yeap BY, Ghosh A, Aldrighetti CM, Willers H, Vapiwala N. Recent trends of “manels”: Gender representation among invited panelists at an international oncology conference. JNCI Cancer Spectr. Published online February 10, 2023. doi:10.1093/jncics/pkad008
