Generalizability of Consensus Regarding SLOE Competitiveness: A Validity Study in a National Sample of Emergency Medicine Faculty

Background: There is a lack of current high quality compensation data for Emergency Medicine (EM) Clerkship Directors (CDs) across the United States (US), despite an expansion of medical schools, EM residency programs and economic inflation. Objectives: To report US EM CD compensation during the academic year 2022-23. Methods: We performed a cross-sectional study of EM CDs. We identified 355 EM CDs using publicly available data from medical school, residency program, and AAMC websites and invited them to complete a confidential electronic survey, consisting of multiple choice and completion items, after piloting prior to use. Descriptive statistics were reported, and we compared categorical variables with χ-squared tests and continuous variables with t-tests. Results: 157 CDs (44%), including those from university, county, community, and rural sites, responded from all US regions. For the CD role, 62% receive full time equivalent (FTE) support (mean 21% +/-17% FTE, 1 SD) and 28% receive a stipend (mean 31, 959 +/-29, 076). A wide range of total compensation was reported (mean 257, 689 +/-123, 650). There was no correlation between FTE support, stipend, or total compensation and the number of rotating students, training, experience, site, or region. Total compensation was significantly higher in men (mean 278, 964) than women (mean 222, 140) (p=0. 009), despite no significant gender difference in CD FTE reduction or stipend. Conclusions: FTE reduction, stipends and total compensation vary highly amongst EM CDs, without correlation to the number of rotating students, training/ experience, type of site (university vs. county vs. community) or US region. Female EM CDs report significantly lower total compensation nationally than men, despite no significant gender difference in FTE support or stipend for the CD role itself.