Engender blog

GUEST POST: Bridging the gender health gap

Women and girls face significant barriers to good mental and physical health. Historic lack of funding for, or professional focus on, health issues that disproportionately affect women, or affect women differently to men, can mean that these issues are not equally accommodated for in health services or awareness-raising initiatives. This anonymous guest blog explores gendered health inequalities and what progress is being made on bridging the gender health gap.

It took roughly six years of medical appointments before a tentative diagnosis of chronic pain – a condition that, by definition, is pain lasting longer than three months despite treatment. Part of the issue was that the pain, among other symptoms, had never really been treated; it was repeatedly misdiagnosed, from appendicitis to pregnancy, and continuously dismissed as stress or growing pains.

It was a strange relief to eventually be referred to an endometriosis specialist and women’s heath physiotherapist session, though the relief was short-lived – while I did receive some pain management, the former concluded that the pain did not appear severe enough to suggest the presence of the condition, nor warrant further investigation, and the latter prescribed mindfulness. Like many others, until recently I had never heard of endometriosis – despite its high prevalence rate and top ranking in the NHS’ 20 most painful conditions. I also found that, like many other people, my experience of healthcare was not unique. In recent years, there has been increasing awareness and recognition of such experiences as symptomatic of a wider issue: a gender disparity in medical research, knowledge and treatment that has amounted to a gender health gap.

Marking 10 years since the Christie Commission

A decade ago saw the report from the Christie Committee, a ground-breaking inquiry which aimed to usher in a new era in public sector delivery in Scotland. To mark 10 years since the release of the report, our Executive Director Emma Ritch joined sector leaders in a special edition of Third Force News magazine to reflect on the Commission and progress made on its recommendations.

Christie finished its work just after the public sector equality duty came into being, and its critical focus on prevention really aligns with the duty.

So much of the inequality that women experience comes from laws, policy, programmes, and institutions that have missed the opportunity to get it right for women in the first place. Everything from transport systems to parks to health services are designed around the preferences and needs of boys and men. The consequences are dire: women in Scotland have less say in their communities, less power, less safety, and fewer resources.

Apply to our new Board Pioneer Programme

Engender is launching our new Board Pioneer Programme offering an opportunity to get involved in feminist governance and see how a board works. Find out more in this blog from our Communications & Admin Assistant Maxine.

EDIT 23/07/21: Following the unexpected death of Engender's Executive Director, Emma Ritch, earlier this month, we are postponing recruitment for the Board Pioneer Programme. We are still very committed to the scheme, and will be relaunching it in the future, when board members will have more capacity to get involved. Thank you for your understanding.

Today we’re launching Engender’s Board Pioneer Programme, based on the excellent work and success of Stellar Quines, the award-winning Scottish theatre company. Stellar Quines launched their Pioneer programme a few years ago and have created a detailed resource pack for others to use the model which highlights the importance of involving and learning from those whose voices are traditionally underrepresented on boards.

When we think of the stereotypical depiction of boards in films and tv, the image that springs to mind is a foreboding group of greying men in suits prioritising profits. According to the Young Trustees Movement, 1 in 12 trustees is named either John or David, and less than 3% of trustees are under 30 which means that the voices of young people, and young women in particular, are sorely lacking on boards across the country. The image of a board as a homogenous group does a disservice to the wealth of experience and knowledge that people from underrepresented groups can share – young people often have caring experience, or experience of working zero-hours contracts, or are involved in on the ground activism. Intergenerational perspectives enable better decision making for boards, and the widespread practice of filling trustee vacancies through informal networks means that boards tend to recruit in their own image, perpetuating the underrepresentation of carers, disabled women and girls, Black and minority ethnic groups, and LGBTI people.

Telemedical abortion services: joint letter to Maree Todd MSP, Minister for Public Health, Women's Health, and Sport

Today Engender and the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) have, together with 25 women's organisations, human rights bodies, and healthcare providers, written to the Scottish Government asking them to make telemedical abortion services permanent in Scotland.

In March 2020, the Scottish Government provided temporary permission for telemedical early medical abortion care. This ensured that women and pregnant people all over Scotland could continue to access abortion care without travel to a clinic, decreasing their own and clinic staff’s risk of exposure to Covid-19. Our letter asks that this change be made permanent, continuing to provide women with as much choice as possible in accessing abortion care.