Our panel of experts discusses the gaps in menopause education and care, and offers advice for women navigating this underaddressed stage of life.
Syreen Goulmamine, M.P.H., CHES®
Programs Manager, Society for Women’s Health Research
What are the most significant gaps in menopause education?
One of the most significant gaps in menopause education is that menopause is still treated as a brief, isolated event rather than a long-term life transition with wide-ranging health implications. Many women receive little to no education or information from healthcare providers until symptoms disrupt their work, relationships, or quality of life.
There are also major gaps in provider training, particularly around symptom diversity, non-hormonal treatment options, and how menopause intersects with chronic conditions like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, autoimmune disease, and mental health. As a result, care providers are not often equipped to discuss with women all that they may need to know about menopause. These gaps are even wider for women of color, women with disabilities, and those navigating menopause earlier due to surgery or medical treatment, as research in these populations is lacking. The result is confusion among women and their providers, delayed treatment, and unnecessary suffering for women.
How can we come together to better equip women to navigate menopause with confidence rather than confusion or stigma?
We need a more inclusive, life-course approach to midlife health that acknowledges all pathways into menopause and brings together healthcare providers, employers, public health leaders, and community organizations. This, first and foremost, means normalizing menopause conversations in clinical care, the workplace, and public health messaging and ensuring that health information related to menopause is evidence-based, culturally responsive, and accessible. Equipping healthcare providers with better training, giving women practical tools to advocate for their care (like SWHR’s Menopause Toolkit and Menopause Care Guide), and creating menopause-friendly workplace policies all matter. Just as importantly, we need to center and celebrate the lived experiences of women in midlife and challenge narratives that frame menopause as something to “endure” and aging as something to avoid, rather than processes to be understood and managed.
What is the most important thing you want women to know about this stage of life?
Whether menopause happens gradually or suddenly due to medical reasons, it is not something you have to go through alone. Your symptoms are real, your experience is valid, and you deserve care that reflects the full context of your health and life. This stage of life can be an opportunity to reset priorities, address — and even work to prevent — long-term health risks, and advocate for care that reflects your whole self. There are many healthcare organizations and community groups doing important work to support women through menopause and make sure the most accurate information is available. SWHR is proud to be among them. With the right information, support, and advocacy, menopause at any age or circumstance can be navigated with dignity, agency, and confidence.
Claire Gill
Founder & President, National Menopause Foundation
What are the most significant gaps in menopause education?
It’s alarming how many gaps exist in menopause education from several standpoints. First, there is a huge gap in women’s general understanding about the menopausal transition, including when it begins, how long it can last, what symptoms can be associated with this natural transition, and what can be done both medically and naturally to help mitigate the severity and frequency of the symptoms.
There is also a significant lack of education and awareness among healthcare professionals about women’s midlife health. In some instances, clinicians have shared that there was no mention of menopause during their entire medical school training. For those clinicians who do recall menopause being mentioned in medical school, it was very brief and very limited in scope. Currently, it is up to the individual clinical professional to seek out continuing medical education in order to be up-to-date on how to diagnose, support, and offer treatment options to their patients going through the menopausal transition. We have too few medical professionals in our country overall, and the number who have obtained specific menopause training is tiny compared to the need.
Unfortunately, what we don’t yet know about women’s health far exceeds what we do know. This is due to a lack of funding and prioritization for the study of women’s health. The National Institutes of Health has traditionally been the largest source of support for scientific research in the United States, and yet, less than 10 percent of its entire annual budget has been focused on women’s health across the lifespan. We can and must do better to study the health conditions that are specific to or have a greater impact on women.
How can we come together to better equip women to navigate menopause with confidence rather than confusion or stigma?
I believe some progress is being made in raising awareness about perimenopause and menopause from many sources. There are now several national nonprofit organizations focused on menopause education and advocacy. The National Menopause Foundation is proud to collaborate with them, identifying priorities and opportunities to work together and reach as many people as possible with evidence-based information. Policy efforts are underway at the federal and state levels to raise awareness and provide legislative incentives and mandates to address menopause care. Social influencers and celebrities are sharing their stories and using their platforms to bring the discussion about the changes and challenges of menopause out in the open. Workplaces are starting to recognize that addressing the needs of their female employees at midlife is essential to their economic success.
Continuing all of these efforts is essential to bring about positive change and progress in helping women thrive at this stage of life, not just survive it. We need to focus on supporting and sharing information about programs currently underway, many led by national nonprofits and free to all, which can have a huge impact on reducing stigma and raising understanding of this important life stage.
What is the most important thing you want women to know about this stage of life?
Every woman’s journey through menopause is a little bit different. The experience can feel minor or all-encompassing, with the ability to affect every area of life. This is why it is so important that all women have access to accurate and accessible education, support, and treatment options. Approximately 1.3 million women enter menopause each year in the United States. It’s estimated that with women’s current average life expectancy, they will spend one-third of their lives postmenopausal. This is a call to action that we need to change the status quo and pay more attention to women in this stage of life.
Christine Muldoon
Senior Vice President, Marketing and Strategy, WebMD Health Services
What are the most significant gaps in menopause education?
People don’t realize that menopause lasts for years and can start as early as a woman’s 40s. We also tend to think it’s all about the hot flashes, when in reality, there are so many symptoms that get less attention, like brain fog, weight gain, joint pain, headaches, and sleep disturbances. We need to create more awareness among women — and men — about what menopause and healthy female aging really look like.
How can we come together to better equip women to navigate menopause with confidence rather than confusion or stigma?
It starts with raising awareness of menopause, especially in the workplace. In a recent survey my organization did with more than 900 women employed by large companies across the United States, one of the respondents said, “One of the best things organizations can do to gain employee loyalty is support them through difficult stages like this.”
It’s so important to understand employee needs, offer resources, train managers, and start the conversation. Providing the right benefits and support, like coverage for life-changing hormone replacement therapy (especially now that the FDA has removed the black box warning), peer support networks, flexible work options, and education, are all helpful ways to support women going through menopause. We just need to talk about it more and make it part of our corporate lexicon. Women can’t feel embarrassed or that their job could be in jeopardy if they reveal they are struggling.
What is the most important thing you want women to know about this stage of life?
Women should know they can thrive during this period of their lives. This is not our mother’s menopause. There’s a lot of help out there now to help us age well, and we don’t have to suffer in silence. We have to advocate for ourselves and use all the resources that are at our disposal.
