Including more women on planning committees for medical conferences could help boost gender equity at these events and limit the number of all-male panels, known as "manels," a study published in JAMA Network Open found.
Researchers assessed the gender makeup of 98 medical conferences held worldwide between March 2017 and November 2018.
Four study findings:
1. Of 23,440 speakers included in the analysis, only 30.1 percent were women.
2. About 36.6 percent of panels were composed solely of men, while just 6.6 percent of panels featured all women.
3. Overall, 96 percent of conferences had at least one all-male panel.
4. Conferences that had women on their planning and steering committees were more likely to also have female speakers.
View the full study here.