Influence of participant and reviewer characteristics in application scores for a hematology research training program

The American Society of Hematology Clinical Research Training Institute (CRTI) is a clinical research training program with a competitive application process. The objectives were to compare application scores based on applicant and reviewer sex and underrepresented minority (URM) status. We included applications to CRTI from 2003 to 2019. The application scores were transformed into a scale from 0 to 100 (100 was the strongest). The factors considered were applicant and reviewer sex and URM status. We evaluated whether there was an interaction between the characteristics and time related to application scores. In total, 713 applicants and 2106 reviews were included. There was no significant difference in scores according to applicant sex. URM applicants had significantly worse scores than non-URM applicants (mean [standard error] 67.9 [1.56] vs 71.4 [0.63]; P = .0355). There were significant interactions between reviewer sex and time (P = .0030) and reviewer URM status and time (P = .0424); thus, results were stratified by time. For the 2 earlier time periods, male reviewers gave significantly worse scores than did female reviewers; this difference did not persist for the most recent time period. The URM reviewers did not give significantly different scores across time periods. URM applicants received significantly lower scores than non-URM applicants. The impact of reviewer sex and URM status changed over time. Although male reviewers gave lower scores in the early periods, this effect did not persist in the late period. Efforts are required to mitigate the impact of applicant URM status on application scores

Burnout in U.S. hematologists and oncologists: impact of compensation models and advanced practice provider support

Burnout is prevalent in throughout medicine. Few large-scale studies have examined the impact of physician compensation or clinical support staff on burnout among hematologists and oncologists. In 2019, the American Society of Hematology conducted a practice survey of hematologists and oncologists in the American Medical Association Masterfile; burnout was measured using a validated, single-item burnout instrument from the Physician Work Life Study, while satisfaction was assessed in several domains using a 5-point Likert scale. The overall survey response rate was 25.2% (N = 631). Of 411 respondents with complete responses in the final analysis, 36.7% (N = 151) were from academic practices and 63.3% (N = 260) from community practices; 29.0% (N = 119) were female. Over one-third (36.5%; N = 150) reported burnout, while 12.0% (N = 50) had a high level of burnout. In weighted multivariate logistic regression models incorporating numerous variables, compensation plans based entirely on relative value unit (RVU) generation were significantly associated with high burnout among academic and community physicians, while the combination of RVU + salary compensation showed no significant association. Female gender was associated with high burnout among academic physicians. High advanced practice provider utilization was inversely associated with high burnout among community physicians. Distinct patterns of career dissatisfaction were observed between academic and community physicians. We propose that implementation of compensation models not based entirely on clinical productivity, increased support for women in academic medicine, and expansion of advanced practice provider support in community practices may address burnout among hematologists and oncologists