Fax +41 61 306 12 34 E-Mail karger@karger.ch www.karger.com Original Paper Cerebrovasc Dis 2011;31:373–381 DOI: 10.1159/000323258 Stroke and Myocardial Infarction: A Comparative Systematic Evaluation of Gender-Specific Analysis, Funding and Authorship Patterns in Cardiovascular Research Sabine Oertelt-Prigione   a Silke Wiedmann   b Matthias Endres   b, c Christian H. Nolte   b, c Vera Regitz-Zagrosek   a, d, e Peter Heuschmann   b a  Institute of Gender in Medicine, b  Center for Stroke Research Berlin, c  Department of Neurology, and d  Center for Cardiovascular Research, Charité-Universitätsmedizin, and e  German Heart Institute, Berlin, Germany the major focus in MI (40%). In both areas, clinical presenta- tion received little attention (3 and 5%). Although publica- tions progressively increased in both fields, an 8- to 10-year time gap emerged for stroke compared to MI. Last authors in both areas were predominantly men, but female last au- thorship is increasing more significantly over time in the field of stroke. Research on sex and gender differences in MI and stroke is largely underfunded, particularly by the EU. Con- clusions: The data demonstrate how sex-/gender-specific research differs between specialties, most likely due to the diverse interest, funding opportunities and authorship dis- tributions identified. Copyright © 2011 S. Karger AG, Basel Introduction The first examples of gender differences that have ma- jor clinical impact on outcomes have been described in the cardiovascular field [1–3]. Women and men are af- fected at different ages, differ in their coronary patho- Key Words Gender differences  Sex differences  Stroke  Myocardial infarction  Gender medicine Abstract Background: Major gender differences exist in cardiovascu- lar diseases and lead to different outcomes in women and men. However, attention and incorporation of sex-/gender- specific research might vary among disciplines. We there- fore conducted a systematic review comparing publication characteristics and trends between stroke and myocardi- al infarction (MI) with respect to sex- and gender-related aspects. Methods: A systematic literature search was per- formed in PubMed to identify gender-/sex-related articles published for stroke and MI between 1977 and 2008. A spe- cifically designed text mining program was used, and all lit- erature was rated by two independent investigators. Publi- cations were classified according to type of research per- formed, publication year, funding, geographical location, and gender of first and last authors. Results: 962 articles were retrieved and limited to 405 (42%) gender-relevant publications; 131 on stroke and 274 on MI. Type of performed research differed, especially in disease management, which received little attention (17%) in stroke, while representing Received: September 20, 2010 Accepted: November 26, 2010 Published online: January 19, 2011 Dr. Sabine Oertelt-Prigione Institute of Gender in Medicine (GiM) Luisenstrasse 65, DE–10117 Berlin (Germany) Tel. +49 30 450 539 069, Fax +49 30 450 539 989 E-Mail sabine.oertelt-prigione  @  charite.de © 2011 S. Karger AG, Basel 1015–9770/11/0314–0373$38.00/0 Accessible online at: www.karger.com/ced This study was presented at the 4th Meeting of the International So- ciety of Gender Medicine and at the 5th Annual Meeting of the Ger- man Society for Epidemiology.