Are the Most Appropriate Research Methods Being Employed to Study Women’s Health?
Basic, observational, and clinical research, and studies of health systems all have contributed to progress in women’s health. Multi-faceted research approaches that tackle a condition from several fronts have yielded important findings which have improved prevention and treatment of breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, and cervical cancer. At the same time, limitations in the design, analysis, and scientific reporting of health research have impeded progress on these and many other conditions. A lack of analysis and reporting of data separately for males and females continues to limit researchers’ ability to identify potentially important sex and gender differences.
In addition to conducting women-only research as appropriate, the research community should strive to integrate women’s health considerations into all health research, such that sex- and gender-based differences between men and women are routinely and consistently assessed. The committee recommends that government and other funding agencies ensure adequate participation of women and reporting of sex-stratified analyses in health research. The committee also recommends that all medical product evaluations by the Food and Drug Administration present efficacy and safety data separately for men and women and that peer-reviewed journals require sex-stratified analysis for publication.
Are the Research Findings Being Translated in a Way that Affects Practice?
It can take 15–20 years for research findings to be incorporated into practice. Barriers to translation range from communication challenges to social or political opposition, to consumer confusion.
Many of these barriers exist for research in general, but some are more specific to women’s health. For example, women more often see different providers for different health concerns, exacerbating problems of fragmented care. A lack of health-care quality measures for many conditions that are specific to women also is problematic, as is failure to analyze sex- and gender-based differences in care.
To reduce these barriers, research should be conducted on how best to rapidly translate the research findings in women’s health into clinical practice and public health policies. Research findings should be incorporated from the practitioner level to the overall public health systems level. Such changes may be achieved, for example, through the use of targeted education programs to practitioners and development of guidelines. As those programs and guidelines are developed and implemented, they should be evaluated to ensure effectiveness.
Are the Research Findings Being Communicated Effectively to Women?
The public often is confused by conflicting findings and opposing recommendations emerging from health research, including women’s health research. Poor communication has in many cases led to substantial confusion and may adversely affect the care of women.
To ensure that messages are clearly conveyed and understood by the public, the committee recommends that HHS appoint a task force to develop strategies to effectively communicate research-based health messages to women. The messages should reach a diverse audience of women; increase awareness of women’s health issues and treatments, including preventive and intervention strategies; and decrease confusion regarding complex and sometimes conflicting findings. The committee suggests including the requirement for all federally funded studies to develop and incorporate a plan for disseminating findings to the public, providers, and policymakers, and establishing a national media advisory panel whose experts would be readily available to provide context to reporters, scientists, clinicians, and policymakers when new women’s health research reports findings are released.
Conclusion
This report finds that the considerable investment in women’s health research of the past two decades has yielded much to improve the health and well-being of women in the US. Despite this important investment, much work remains in all aspects of research. Given the multiple and significant roles women play in our society, maintaining support for women’s health research and enhancing its impact are not only in the interest of women, they are in the interest of us all.
The complete report may be read online.
More Articles
- New Insights Into How Genetic Differences Among Individuals Influence Breast Cancer Risk from Low-Dose Radiation
- Were You Considering Testing Your Genetic Makeup for Disease Prediction? "The road to efficient genetic risk prediction is likely to be long.”
- The Likelihood Function Studied: Early Menopause and Osteoporosis
- Examining Proportion of Women Who Survive Following Detection of Breast Cancer Through Screening
- A Tale of Two Countries: The Hyde Amendment Turns 35
- Between Dusk and Bedtime: Suppressing a Sleep Hormone
- Reviews of Two Books by Elizabeth Edwards: Resilience and Saving Graces
- Stepping Out of Dark Shadows: A Diagnosis
- The Fracture Risk Assessment Tool
