The Women's Health Initiative Is the Latest DOGE Victim—What This Means for Midlife Women's Health
In a country where women were essentially left out of major health research and clinical trials until the 1990s, we can't afford to widen the women's health research gap any further. However this week, the Trump administration's 'Department of Government Efficiency' majorly slashed research budgets for the National Institutes of Health-funded Women's Health Initiative (WHI), which is the largest and longest running project of its kind devoted to women's health, from researching menopause treatments and mental health to more.
Ongoing research with the WHI has supported more than 42,000 female study participants, ranging from ages 78 to 108; some people have even been involved in the large-scale study since the early 1990s, during which over 160,000 women participated. The initiative has been responsible for diagnosing 38,000 cancer cases and documenting 38,000 cardiovascular events, according to the WHI.
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The irony is that cutting funding for decades worth of research in progress isn't by any means efficient, as the DOGE claims.
'When you think about cutting waste and fraud, it's actually creating more waste if you're not allowing people to finish the projects that they started,' says Dr. Judith Joseph, chair of the Women in Medicine Initiative at Columbia University, assistant clinical professor at NYU Langone Medical Center, psychiatrist, researcher, and author of the book High Functioning. Joseph, who has worked on both her own clinical research in a New York City-based lab that she leads and NIH-funded research throughout her career, emphasizes that cutting research short does not allow researchers to reach the essential conclusions they need to about health conditions.
What else do you need to know about the implications of these research budget cuts, and is there anything that can be done about it? The answer is yes, but it needs to be an all-hands-on-deck situation.
The landmark WHI study has been so monumental for understanding risk factors for certain outcomes, including heart disease in women, dementia in women, osteoporosis in women, fibroids, postpartum depression and mental health conditions related to perimenopause and menopause, says Joseph. And the point it to use this data for preventative healthcare—not just being reactive to a dementia diagnosis or a heart attack once it happens.
Because women were not studied in major research trials until the early 1990s, there's still a gap in understanding everything we need to know about these conditions. So much funding is allocated to treat certain conditions, but more needs to continue to be allocated toward research to better understand the preventative side of medicine and relieve so much strain on the healthcare system.
'Half the population is understudied, and we're missing opportunities to cut waste to the healthcare system,' adds Joseph.
It's crucial for research to be done, specifically in women as opposed to just in men and the data estimated or adapted for women, as it had been for decades. Certain health conditions, especially as women age, have different symptoms and effects in women than in men.
'We know that women experience more frailty than men, have more cognitive loss, present with cardiovascular disease differently than men and make up more of nursing home populations,' says Dr. Mindy Goldman, a San Francisco-based OB-GYN and chief clinical officer at Midi Health. 'Cutting off funding for critical women's health research means less understanding of cardiovascular disease in women, osteoporosis in women and cognitive loss in women.'
These cuts to 30 years worth of key data are not only harmful to women's health but also diminish women's role in society, Goldman adds. But there are a few things we can do to potentially make a difference.
Contact Your State Legislators
'It's true that the NIH is the largest funder of medical research in the country—but that doesn't mean that there aren't other avenues to pursue,' explains Jennifer Weiss-Wolf, an attorney, author, executive director of the Birnbaum Women's Leadership Center at NYU School of Law and Flow Space Advisory Council member. 'States are really a ripe place for these opportunities and changes, too.'
It's never a waste of time to make your voice heard by your state senators and representatives.
There are already 21 bills about women's midlife and menopausal health that have been introduced in 13 states, Weiss-Wolf says. The bills involve access to menopause care, the affordability of menopause care coverage and menopause education for clinical professionals and menopause awareness for the general public.
Another huge goal is funding more research through state governments and state university systems so that they can still continue research outside of the NIH, shares Weiss-Wolf. Along with Let's Talk Menopause and Dr. Mary Claire Haver, Weiss-Wolf created a Citizen's Guide to Menopause Advocacy that you can follow with links to to write to or call your senators, representatives and governor about how this research and healthcare impacts your life and is necessary to your well-being.
Get Involved in Research and Health Organizations on a Grassroots Basis
Patients are crucial to research initiatives, especially when it comes to clinical trials, which act as treatments for diseases like cancer, for example, emphasizes Joseph.
'If we didn't have clinical research, people would not be surviving cancer,' she says. That said, patients play an important role and have a voice in the research landscape. You can go to clinicaltrials.gov to get involved in a study pertinent to your condition, and you can even get involved in research at local universities, suggests Joseph.
So many organizations advocate for women's health too, from the American Heart Association to the Menopause Society, Joseph points out. You can get involved with any one of these organizations on a grassroots level and make sure your or your loved one's story is heard.
'Your condition matters, and there are human stories behind these conditions,' Joseph says.
Talk to Your Own Healthcare Providers
For anyone who receives healthcare through a university hospital system, your provider could be involved in key research. Joseph recommends asking your clinician how their work, if they also do research, may be impacted and what changes might affect patients.
It's important to know whether or not you'll still be able to see this practitioner who already has been working with you. Some details about the research budget cuts remain unknown, so it's important to do some digging about how this can impact you on a local level.
Know That Individual Companies Can Still Fund Private Research
Along with university systems, individual pharmaceutical and supplement companies need to continue crucial women's health research, says Dr. Alyssa Dweck, chief medical officer of Bonafide Health and Menopause Society-certified practitioner. Her company, Bonafide, runs privately-funded research in conjunction with academic institutions about the safety and efficacy of women's health and menopausal wellness products.
Because the academic institutions and state and federal governments are not funding the research, it can still continue, according to Dweck. 'It opens up a huge opportunity to fill what might turn out to be a void in the study of hormonal health.'
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