ReviewBMJ global health2021
The gender and geography of publishing: a review of sex/gender reporting and author representation in leading general medical and global health journals.
Review in BMJ global health, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 33 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
33 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Examination of Sex-Specific Participant Inclusion in Exercise Physiology Endothelial Function Research: A Systematic Review.Frontiers in sports and active living · 2022Pooled it
- Assessing the impact of polio supplementary immunisation activities on routine immunisation and health systems: a systematic review.BMJ global health · 2021Pooled it
- Sex and gender reporting in Australian cancer clinical trials: are we doing enough?Research integrity and peer review · 2026Article
- Twenty years of sex and gender science in health research: a policy statement from the Organization for the Study of Sex Differences.Biology of sex differences · 2026Review
- Sex and Gender Differences in Chronic Kidney Disease-Explained by the Brenner-Luyckx Concept of Hyperfiltration.Journal of clinical medicine · 2026Review
- Patient and author diversity and representation in studies supporting the European Respiratory Society/European Society of Intensive Care Medicine/European Society of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases/Asociación Latinoamericana de Tórax severe community-acquired pneumonia guidelines.Respiratory research & clinical practice · 2026Article
- Tracing global inequities in radiology research: a multi-level analysis of research output.Pediatric radiology · 2025Review
- Continual learning across population cohorts with distribution shift: insights from multi-cohort metabolic syndrome identification.Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA · 2025Article
- Systematic Evaluation of How Indicators of Inequity and Disadvantage Are Measured and Reported in Population Health Evidence Syntheses.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Review
- Implementation science research priorities for Universal Health Coverage: methodological lessons from the design and implementation of a multicountry modified Delphi study.Health policy and planning · 2025Article
- Evaluating Covid-19 publications for sex and gender-specific health content: A bibliometric analysis.PloS one · 2025Article
- Review of the Influences of Sex Differences on Health and Disease: What Is the Role of Journals?The Journal of bone and joint surgery. American volume · 2024Review
- Theory of change for addressing sex and gender bias, invisibility and exclusion in Australian health and medical research, policy and practice.Health research policy and systems · 2024Article
- Disparities in paediatric radiology research publications from low- and lower middle-income countries: a time for change.Pediatric radiology · 2024Article
- Review
- Gender disparity between first and senior authors on liver cancer research in the top journals of Gastroenterology and Hepatology.PloS one · 2024Article
- Sex and gender reporting in RCTs of internet and mobile-based interventions for depression and anxiety in chronic conditions: A secondary analysis of a systematic review.PLOS mental health · 2024Article
- Authorship inequalities in global health research: the IeDEA Southern Africa collaboration.BMJ global health · 2023Article
- Review
- Ethnicity and gender trends of UK authors inEClinicalMedicine · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
Abstract
introductionDiverse gender and geographical representation matters in research. We aimed to review medical and global health journals' sex/gender reporting, and the gender and geography of authorship.
methods542 research and non-research articles from 14 selected journals were reviewed using a retrospective survey design. Paper screening and systematic data extraction was conducted with descriptive statistics and regression analyses calculated from the coded data. Outcome measures were journal characteristics, the extent to which published articles met sex/gender reporting guidelines, plus author gender and location of their affiliated institution.
resultsFive of the fourteen journals explicitly encourage sex/gender analysis in their author instructions, but this did not lead to increased sex/gender reporting beyond the gender of study participants (OR=3.69; p=0.000 (CI 1.79 to 7.60)). Just over half of research articles presented some level of sex/gender analysis, while 40% mentioned sex/gender in their discussion. Articles with women first and last authors were 2.4 times more likely to discuss sex/gender than articles with men in those positions (p=0.035 (CI 1.062 to 5.348)). First and last authors from high-income countries (HICs) were 19 times as prevalent as authors from low-income countries; and women from low-income and middle-income countries were at a disadvantage in terms of the impact factor of the journals they published in.
conclusionGlobal health and medical research fails to consistently apply a sex/gender lens and remains largely the preserve of authors in HIC. Collaborative partnerships and funding support are needed to promote gender-sensitive research and dismantle historical power dynamics in authorship.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.