Underrepresentation of Women in Trials of Atrial Fibrillation Ablations: Fact or Thinking?

Equal sex and race representation in medical research has been prioritized by the National Institutes of Health for decades, starting with the establishment of the Office of Research on Women's Health in 1990. Recent developments were the introduction of the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility editorial board for all journals of the American Heart Association to foster diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility principles.1, 2 However, underrepresentation of women continues in clinical trials, including in the field of cardiology.3 The timely systematic review by Khiang et al.4 in this issue of the Journal of the American Heart Association (JAHA) investigates whether this is also the case for trials of radiofrequency ablation (RFA), cryoablation, and pulmonary vein isolation ablation in atrial fibrillation (AF).