Health inequalties

Women’s health

Women make up 51% of the UK population, but there is clear evidence to show that women are not receiving the same level of care, investigation or treatment for common and important diseases when compared to men. The consequence of this inequality is that women have demonstrable worse clinical outcomes in many significant disease areas than men.

Gender stereotyping and gender bias have led to a health care system which consistently delivers and accepts poorer health outcomes for women compared to men. Diagnosis and treatment are often based on male-centred research without consideration of the age dependent differences in the physiology of women. Women’s health needs are frequently considered only in terms of reproductive health which fails to capture the diverse needs of women, girls, and older women.

More work must be done to understand sex differences in pathophysiology, treatment response and effectiveness, as well as access to healthcare focused on reducing gender inequities.

Older woman in a wheelchair with younger smiling woman

Our mission

Our mission is to reduce health inequalities for women, by ensuring that all women have access to the best quality health and care.

Our Women’s health strategy draws heavily on recently published reports for women’s health in England including: “A Women’s Health Agenda: Redressing the Balance”, “Women’s Health Strategy for England“, and “Better for Women”. The UK government’s strategy is underpinned by strong qualitative evidence from 100,000 women across England and identifies a need for increased awareness of gender inequalities and better understanding of the impact of overlapping intersectional factors.

Download our Women’s Health strategy

News and case studies

Contact us

If you’d like to find out more about our work in Women’s Health or are interested in collaborating with us, get in touch.

Get in touch

Similar programmes

1/6.

Population Health Programme

The Population Health Academy equips staff to improve population health. It tackles inequalities through workforce development, offering online resources, training, and networking. This empowers staff to deliver targeted services and prevent illness, ultimately contributing to better health outcomes across the region.

2/6.

Managing deterioration

Improving the management of deterioration. Promoting the Prevention, Identification, Escalation and Response (PIER) framework, which helps systems to take a consistent approach to physical deterioration and working to support the delivery of Martha’s Rule.

3/6.

Systems safety

Creating optimal conditions for patient safety improvement across health and integrated care systems. This includes the Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF) and Patient Safety Collaborative Safety Networks.

4/6.

Maternity and neonatal

Supporting maternity and neonatal professionals to improve the optimisation and stabilisation of pre-term infants and the early recognition and management deterioration in women and babies. We also support the Perinatal Culture and Leadership programme as part of this workstream, continuing to sustainably develop leadership capacity, capability and improvement relating to safety culture in our local trusts.

5/6.

Medicines safety

Patient Safety Collaborative programme supporting healthcare professionals to improve chronic non-cancer pain management by reducing high-risk opioid prescribing.

6/6.

Innovation for Healthcare Inequalities Programme (InHIP)

Health Innovation KSS is supporting its three local Integrated Care Systems to improve access to innovations that reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by delivering projects aimed at the specific needs of underserved communities in each county.