Challenging the gender health gap

Women in the UK spend more of their lives in ill health and disability than men, despite living longer on average - this was the finding outlined in the National Women’s and Girls’ Health Strategy, 2022. To address this gender health gap, the strategy set out a mandate to enhance the quality and accessibility of women's and girls' health services, supported by the allocation of funds to Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) to establish Women's and Girls' health hubs.  

A Women and Girls Health Hub is a model of care that aims to provide integrated services within a community. The model seeks to reduce health inequalities, provide greater access to healthcare, improve health outcomes, and improve healthcare experiences.  

Commissioners, healthcare providers, and leaders from voluntary and community sectors recently attended co-design workshops in south east London to develop a blueprint for a local hub model to improve services and health outcomes for women and girls across the population.   

Ahead of the workshop, expert panellists explained what they thought the hub should be 

Women's and Girls' health data will lead the way

The data that came out of the National Women’s and Girls’ Health Strategy, 2022, revealed the challenges facing women and girls today. It showed that women with existing health conditions and disabilities are less likely to feel comfortable talking to healthcare professionals about some topics. It also highlighted the disparities in health outcomes between different demographic groups.  

Charlotte Parkes, one of the workshop panellists, said we need to be consistent in the use of our intelligence, so data can lead our healthcare interventions, planning, and thinking. Women's and girls' health will evolve over time, so Charlotte stressed that the data needs to be strengthened so new challenges aren't missed and we can identify where support is most needed.  

Accounting for the health implications of childhood experiences 

Charlotte warned that many health professionals are missing the adverse childhood experiences and the impact that they can have on reproductive health choices.  

"If we are able to support those young people in actually receiving the help and the guidance that they need, we have a better chance of them making better informed reproductive health choices. It's a passion of mine, and I think that we're missing a trick in not addressing some of those issues".

Support people where they want to be supported 

While the majority agreed a person-centred approach could improve health outcomes, the task of the workshop was to figure out how that could be achieved with the allocated funds and resources.  

Charlotte gave an example of how this challenge was being addressed in Greenwich with a pilot programme. The project looked to support women with a high rate of pregnancy termination. The programme identified women of a reproductive age and filtered the women based on ethnicity, mental health issues, learning disabilities, and known substance misuse issues. These individuals are at a higher risk of unplanned pregnancy, poorer reproductive health choices, and poor preconception health.  

An important part of their programme was meeting people where they're at, whether it be a local coffee shop or community centre, she said  

"Wherever that woman is, we will meet them and support them - not only in talking through their contraceptive choices and their reproductive health, but also using the opportunity to address some of the secondary outcomes, such as weight management, smoking cessation, and alcohol support. We will take a holistic approach, but the primary aim is to support that woman, to make those more informed contraceptive choices."

A way to connect with specialist women's and girls’ support 

A theme we heard from Prof Prashant Jha at KHP Annual Conference 2024 was that GPs need more time and training to support patients through menopause. His research found that on average women go through three years of doctor appointments before receiving a diagnosis of menopause. 

This theme was raised again by Dr Rebecca Long, at the Women's and Girls' Health Hub workshop, when she said "a general practitioner cannot be specialist in everything" so there is a gap between clinicians in secondary care who have that specialist skill set and GPs who don't have that specialist interest.  

Talking about the Women and Girls Health Hub, Dr Long said she wanted it to be a way for women experiencing menopause to connect with practitioners who have additional training and specialist knowledge. She suggested the hub could be an opportunity to identify the women who need specialist support, because not every menopausal woman needs to be in secondary care, and many can be happily supported within their communities. She was also optimistic the hub could enable this to happen in a community setting, where women would feel comfortable attending and discussing their health needs.  

The results of the co-design workshop 

After the panel discussion, attendees were asked to work in groups with patient case studies, to design a hub that would meet that patient's needs.  

One group looked at reaching a young student through their hub by using social media to provide health information from a reputable source. They proposed training health champions and peer community ambassadors to provide support where they're at.  

Another case study looked at a girl with adverse childhood experiences. They identified the need for a caseworker so the girl had more time to be supported and could receive continuity of care from a trusted person. Others worked to support a woman from a different country who may be unaware that primary care is free at the point of access in the UK. They designed the hub to be a source of information, sharing the health checks that were available to her.  

Women's and Girls' Health Hubs should: 

• Join up health and care services in the community; 
• Help more women access information in an easy-to-understand and culturally appropriate way to make decisions about their health and wellbeing; 
• Support women with specific health issues and conditions such as heavy menstrual bleeding disorders and menopause treatment to be seen in the right setting, by the right professional, at the right time. 

To keep updated with the hub’s development visit South East London Let’s Talk Webpage.