Merone Lea, Tsey Komla, Russell Darren, Nagle Cate
College of Healthcare Sciences, James Cook University, Townsville, Queensland, Australia.
College of Arts, Society and Education, James Cook University, Smithfield, Queensland, Australia.
Womens Health Rep (New Rochelle). 2022 Sep 12;3(1):759-767. doi: 10.1089/whr.2022.0033. eCollection 2022.
Historically, medical studies have underrepresented female participants and most research data have been collected from males and generalized to other genders. This article aims to determine if there is a sex and/or gender gap in recent Australian health research.
This descriptive cross-sectional study of the published literature examines recent Australian-based clinical trials for inclusion of sex and gender. Medians and interquartile ranges (IQRs) were calculated for study sample sizes and female:male representation. Proportion of sex and/or gender was analyzed by the clinical specialty of the trials. -Tests were used to ascertain significance of any difference in recruitment of female and males.
A total of 88 articles were included in the analysis. Most studies ( = 63) were randomized clinical controlled trials. Overall women constituted 55% (IQR 30% of all participants). Of the 71 mixed-sex studies, only 8.9% ( = 7) analyzed the data by sex. Women were significantly underrepresented in cardiology and nephrology studies and overrepresented in psychiatry, care of the elderly, and orthopedic studies.
When analyzed by specialty, women are overrepresented in specialties considered to be female patient dominated, such as psychiatry and care of the elderly, and underrepresented in specialties such as cardiology and nephrology. The overrepresentation of women in some specialties can reinforce gender stereotypes, potentially harming women. In addition, exclusion of males from these areas of research may be of disservice to men's health.
从历史上看，医学研究中女性参与者的比例一直偏低，大多数研究数据是从男性身上收集的，并推广到其他性别。本文旨在确定澳大利亚近期的健康研究中是否存在性别差异。
这项已发表文献的描述性横断面研究，考察了近期澳大利亚开展的纳入性别因素的临床试验。计算了研究样本量以及女性与男性比例的中位数和四分位间距（IQR）。按试验的临床专科分析性别比例。采用t检验确定招募女性和男性的差异是否具有显著性。
分析共纳入88篇文章。大多数研究（n = 63）为随机临床对照试验。总体而言，女性占所有参与者的55%（IQR 30%）。在71项男女混合的研究中，只有8.9%（n = 7）按性别分析了数据。在心脏病学和肾脏病学研究中，女性的代表性明显不足，而在精神病学、老年护理和骨科研究中，女性的代表性过高。
按专科分析时，女性在被认为以女性患者为主的专科（如精神病学和老年护理）中代表性过高，而在心脏病学和肾脏病学等专科中代表性不足。女性在某些专科中的过高代表性可能会强化性别刻板印象，潜在地损害女性利益。此外，将男性排除在这些研究领域之外可能对男性健康不利。
