Women across the country will be better heard and served under new plans set out in the renewed Women’s Health Strategy, unveiled by the government this week.
Women’s experiences will be put at the centre of care across the healthcare system, ensuring patients’ voices are listened to and acted upon, including exploring ways in which women’s feedback can be directly linked to provider funding and targeted improvements through a new trial. The move aims to ensure services are held accountable for listening to women, in a bid to stamp out long-standing issues with women being ignored.
Women will be directed to the right professional first time through a single referral point, along with marrying local services with online support to drastically cut waiting lists and ensure women no longer face years-long waits for diagnosis and treatment for conditions like endometriosis, which can take nearly a decade to diagnose.
A new standard of care will also be produced to ensure women are finally offered appropriate and effective pain relief for invasive gynaecological procedures, from contraceptive fitting through to hysteroscopies, addressing long-standing concerns around inadequate pain management.
Health and Social Care Secretary, Wes Streeting, said: "We inherited a broken NHS, which was particularly felt by women, who have for so long been let down by a healthcare system that too often gaslights women, treating their pain as an inconvenience and their symptoms as an overreaction.
"Whether it’s being passed from one appointment to another for conditions like endometriosis and fibroids, or a lack of proper pain relief during invasive procedures, through to having to navigate symptoms for years before receiving a diagnosis, it’s clear the system is failing women.
"Women’s voices must be central to delivering effective, respectful and empathetic care. We need to hit medical misogyny where it hurts - the wallet. Today’s renewed strategy will tackle the issues women face every day and ensure no woman is left fighting to be heard."
Dr Sue Mann, NHS England’s clinical director for women’s health, said: "We have come a long way in the last decade with women’s health being talked about more but there are still parts of society and the health system that are trapped in outdated thinking. Too many women are still dismissed for serious symptoms that impact on every part of their lives, whether that’s menstrual pain, irregular periods, or hot flushes and brain fog that affect many women experiencing the menopause.
"The renewed Women’s Health Strategy will build significantly on the work the NHS has been doing to ensure women are heard and get the specialist care they need - with a focus on bringing down waiting times, delivering more care in communities and giving women more choice over their care."
Reforms set out in the renewed strategy include:
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redesigning clinical pathways for heavy periods, urogynaecology and menopause to speed up diagnosis and treatment
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funding a specialist centre in each region to introduce group-based approaches to care, helping women understand and manage their conditions better
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launching a new £1 million programme to improve menstrual education so girls are better equipped to recognise the signs and symptoms of unhealthy periods
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launching a £1.5 million Femtech challenge fund to accelerate adoption of innovations that could transform women’s healthcare in the future
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establishing the women’s voices partnership to bring organisations representing women together to help inform future policy and decision making
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providing better access to contraceptive and abortion care with continued support for protected spaces
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reviewing how different levels of support should work for families who experience repeated baby loss, and update the guidance based on that
Through NIHR, the government is also funding research into areas of unmet need for women’s health, including to improve care for young women living with intense period pain and first-of-its-kind technology to treat threatened miscarriage. NIHR is also embedding new sex and gender policies into health research, so that findings are genuinely representative and no woman is left behind by science.
This work builds on the government’s action to reform women’s health, including:
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free emergency contraception in pharmacies
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at-home HPV testing kits
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gynaecology as the first specialty for NHS Online
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the introduction of bereavement leave for miscarriage
From this year, the standard NHS Health Check offered to all adults aged 40 to 74 will also include a question about menopause symptoms, giving up to 5 million women an easier route to advice and support.
