The National Health Service is a great institution—but right now, it’s failing to provide women with the care they need. The UK has one of the the largest gender health gaps in the G20, according to recent health and survival data released by World Economic Forum. There are far too many statistics that confirm this. For instance, less than 2.5 percent of publicly funded research goes into reproductive health. Women are also 50 percent more likely to get an initial wrong diagnosis when they’re having a heart attack. After surgery, women are half as likely as men to receive painkillers, because they are expected to be better at bearing pain. If you’re a Black woman, you’re nearly four times as likely to die within six weeks of giving birth than white women, with Asian women nearly twice as likely according to UK figures. The list goes on and on.
Typically, getting a diagnosis and a treatment for women’s conditions in the UK can take several months, if not years, by which point their disease has developed into a more serious condition that will be more challenging and expensive to treat. The usual process goes a little bit like this: It can take weeks to get an appointment; the GP might request a routine gynecological ultrasound scan and blood tests, which means you may go on a waiting list; the follow-up appointment with your gynecologist might take months to schedule, by which point your scan and blood test results may no longer be valid, so you need a fresh round of tests. This is not acceptable.
One in three women suffer from reproductive health problems at some stage in their life and, in most cases, getting a diagnosis in the NHS is extremely challenging. For common conditions like endometriosis—a disease in which tissue similar to the lining of the womb grows outside of it—it takes on average around seven and a half years to get a diagnosis. According to data from Cancer Research UK, around 60 percent of ovarian cancer is diagnosed too late.
One-stop-shop female health clinics could help tackle many of these issues, including fertility diagnosis. These clinics would be located in communities, rather than in hospitals, so they could be more easily accessed by patients. In a one-stop appointment, women could have a consultation, a detailed ultrasound scan, a blood test, and a smear test if it is due. This batch of tests would allow for faster and earlier diagnosis of many common female health issues—such as fibroids, polyps, adenomyosis, ovarian cysts, and fertility issues—as well as a discussion about menopause where relevant. One visit would be all that it takes to give a woman the initial diagnosis she deserves, rather than waiting for months and months.
Building a network of one-stop-shop female health clinics in local communities around the country would reduce NHS costs in the long run by improving access to care where referrals are needed and by reducing waiting times. Giving women an earlier diagnosis will also ultimately reduce health care costs and improve health and well-being for women.
This approach could be a game changer. If we empower more health care professionals with the knowledge and skills to deliver this type of comprehensive service, we can give women the health care they deserve, and close the gender health gap.
Correction: 7/11/2025, 4:00 PM EDT: The piece has been updated to correct the UK's gender health gap ranking amongst the G20.
This article appears in the July/August 2023 edition of WIRED UK magazine.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
