Research productivity of RANZCR radiation oncology trainees from 2014 to 2023

Introduction: The aim of this study was to describe the research productivity among RANZCR Radiation Oncology (RO) trainees.

Methods: Publicly available data on RO fellows, who were awarded the RANZCR fellowship between July 2014 and June 2023, was extracted from the RANZCR Annual Reports. Fellows who had qualified overseas and did not undertake full RANZCR training were excluded. A PubMed search was performed for publications by each fellow in the 5 years prior, and 6 months, after the estimated completion of training. Research productivity was defined as the number of first-author and any-author publications per trainee.

Results: In total, 168 eligible RO fellows were included in this study. 104 (62%) and 118 (70%) fellows had first-author and any-author publications during training, respectively. A total of 203 first-author and 308 unique any-author publications were identified, with mean first-author and any-author publications per trainee of 1.21 (SD = 2.37) and 2.02 (SD = 3.71), respectively. Trainee research was most commonly published in JMIRO (34% of first-author and 27% of any-author publications). There were significant differences in the number of first-author publications by gender (P = 0.04) and training jurisdictions (P = 0.03). There were also differences in the number of any-author publications by gender (P = 0.002) and training jurisdictions (P = 0.03). There was a significant increase in any-author publications over the 9-year study period (P = 0.005).

Conclusion: This is the first study evaluating research productivity among RO fellows during training. We identified disparities in research productivity by gender and training jurisdictions. This offers opportunities to tailor efforts to better support a vibrant and productive research culture across the RO training program.