title: Endangered academia: preserving the pediatric surgeon scientist.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Pediatric surgery is one of the most difficult surgical fellowships to obtain. It requires stellar academic credentials and, often, dedicated time pursuing research. It is unknown, however, if pediatric surgeons maintain high academic output as faculty members. We hypothesized that the majority of pediatric surgeons do not pursue robust research activities as faculty, and therefore, over time, their academic productivity decreases.
  
  
  METHODS
  Numbers of publications, citations, H-index, and NIH funding rates were determined for 4354 surgical faculty at the top-55 NIH based departments of surgery using websites, Scopus, NIH RePORTER, and Grantome. Continuous variables were compared with ANOVA and post-hoc Bonferroni; categorical variables by χ2test. p<0.05 was significant.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In this dataset, 321 pediatric surgery (PS) faculty represented 7.4% of the cohort. Among PS faculty, 31% were assistant professors, 24% associate professors, 31% full professors and 13% had no academic rank. PS faculty had significantly more publications, a higher H index, and more high level NIH funding early in their careers at the assistant professor level compared to general surgeons. PS faculty at the associate professor level had equivalent high level NIH funding, but lower recentness and academic power compared to general surgeons. Professors of PS rebounded slightly, with only observed deficiencies in number of citations compared to general surgeons.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  PS faculty in assistant professor ranks has higher scholarly productivity compared to equivalently ranked general surgeons. Despite some mild academic setbacks in midcareer, pediatric surgeons are able to maintain similar academic productivity to their general surgery colleagues by the time they are full professors.
  
  
  METHODS
  2.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN 46202. Electronic address: tmarkel@iupui.edu.
authors.forename: Troy A
authors.initials: TA
authors.lastname: Markel
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN 46202.
authors.forename: Nakul P
authors.initials: NP
authors.lastname: Valsangkar
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN 46202.
authors.forename: Teresa M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Bell
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN 46202.
authors.forename: Brandon A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Kiel
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN 46202.
authors.forename: Teresa A
authors.initials: TA
authors.lastname: Zimmers
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN 46202.
authors.forename: Leonidas G
authors.initials: LG
authors.lastname: Koniaris
mesh_terms: D035843:Biomedical Research / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004526:Efficiency; D005180:Faculty, Medical / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D010372:Pediatrics / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011643:Publishing / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D012109:Research Support as Topic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D013043:Specialties, Surgical / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D066231:Surgeons / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D014481:United States
keywords: Academic metrics; Citations; H-index; Pediatric surgery; Pediatric surgery workforce; Publications