The positive association of Association for Academic Surgery membership with academic productivity.

BACKGROUND: To evaluate the academic productivity and National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding of members of the Association for Academic Surgery (AAS). METHODS: Academic metrics including, numbers of publications, citations, and NIH funding history were determined for 4015 surgical faculty at the top 55 NIH-funded departments of surgery, using Scopus, NIH RePORT, and the Grantome online databases. RESULTS: AAS membership included 20.5% (824) of all 4015 surgical faculty in this database. For members of the AAS, publications (P) ± standard deviation and citations (C) ± SD were P: 54 ± 96 and C: 985 ± 3321, compared with P: 31 ± 92, C: 528 ± 3001 for nonmembers, P < 0.001. Higher academic productivity among AAS members was observed across all subspecialty types and was especially pronounced for assistant and associate professors. AAS membership was also associated with increased rates of NIH funding and better productivity for equally funded surgical faculty compared with nonmembers. Analysis of AAS membership by subspecialty revealed that AAS members were most commonly general surgery faculty (57.8%); however, only 7.4% of the faculty was affiliated with cardiothoracic surgery. There was also a lack of dedicated science and/or research faculty (0.6% versus 3.4%) among the members of the AAS. CONCLUSIONS: AAS membership appears to be correlated with greater academic performance among junior and midlevel surgical faculty. This improvement is observed regardless of subspecialty. Increased participation of faculty within subspecialties such as cardiothoracic surgery and, a greater focus on increasing the numbers of dedicated research faculty within the AAS may help increase the scientific impact and productivity among members of the society.

The impact of members of the Society of University Surgeons on the scholarship of American surgery.

BACKGROUND: A core objective of the Society of University Surgeons (SUS) is research focused: to "advance the art and science of surgery through original investigation." This study sought to determine the current impact of the SUS on academic surgical productivity. METHODS: Individual faculty data for numbers of publications, citations, and National Institute of Health (NIH) funding history were collected for 4,015 surgical faculty at the top 55 NIH-funded departments of surgery using SCOPUS and the NIH Research Portfolio Online Reporting Tools. SUS membership was determined from membership registry data. RESULTS: Overall, 502 surgical faculty (12.5%) were SUS members with 92.7% holding positions of associate or full professor (versus 59% of nonmembers). Median publications (P) and citations (C) among SUS members were P: 112, C: 2,460 versus P: 29, C: 467 for nonmembers (P < .001). Academic productivity was considerably higher by rank for SUS members than for nonmembers: associate professors (P: 61 vs 36, C: 1,199 vs 591, P < .001) and full professors (P: 141 vs 81, C: 3,537 vs 1,856, P < .001). Among full professors, SUS members had much higher rates of NIH funding than did nonmembers (52.6% vs 26%, P < .05) and specifically for R01, P01, and U01 awards (37% vs 17.7%, P < .01). SUS members were 2 times more likely to serve in divisional leadership or chair positions (23.5% vs 10.2%, P < .05). CONCLUSION: SUS society members are a highly productive academic group. These data support the premise that the SUS is meeting its research mission and identify its members as very academically productive contributors to research and scholarship in American surgery and medicine.

Determining the Drivers of Academic Success in Surgery: An Analysis of 3,850 Faculty.

OBJECTIVE: Determine drivers of academic productivity within U.S. departments of surgery. METHODS: Eighty academic metrics for 3,850 faculty at the top 50 NIH-funded university- and 5 outstanding hospital-based surgical departments were collected using websites, Scopus, and NIH RePORTER. RESULTS: Mean faculty size was 76. Overall, there were 35.3% assistant, 27.8% associate, and 36.9% full professors. Women comprised 21.8%; 4.9% were MD-PhDs and 6.1% PhDs. By faculty-rank, median publications/citations were: assistant, 14/175, associate, 39/649 and full-professor, 97/2250. General surgery divisions contributed the most publications and citations. Highest performing sub-specialties per faculty member were: research (58/1683), transplantation (51/1067), oncology (41/777), and cardiothoracic surgery (48/860). Overall, 23.5% of faculty were principal investigators for a current or former NIH grant, 9.5% for a current or former R01/U01/P01. The 10 most cited faculty (MCF) within each department contributed to 42% of all publications and 55% of all citations. MCF were most commonly general (25%), oncology (19%), or transplant surgeons (15%). Fifty-one-percent of MCF had current/former NIH funding, compared with 20% of the rest (p<0.05); funding rates for R01/U01/P01 grants was 25.1% vs. 6.8% (p<0.05). Rate of current-NIH MCF funding correlated with higher total departmental NIH rank (p < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS: Departmental academic productivity as defined by citations and NIH funding is highly driven by sections or divisions of research, general and transplantation surgery. MCF, regardless of subspecialty, contribute disproportionally to major grants and publications. Approaches that attract, develop, and retain funded MCF may be associated with dramatic increases in total departmental citations and NIH-funding.