Viewpoint on the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research < Yale School of Medicine

The JAMA Internal Medicine issue published on November 1 leads with Carolyn M. Mazure, PhD’s, latest Viewpoint, “The White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research.” This perspective piece provides an understanding of the historical background for the White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research and its goal, which is to fundamentally change how we approach and fund women’s health research.

The White House Initiative on Women’s Health Research was launched in November 2023 through a Presidential Memorandum. It is led by First Lady Dr. Jill Biden in collaboration with the White House Gender Policy Council and is chaired by Mazure.

In her Viewpoint, Mazure shows how under-representation of women in clinical research and inattention to sex as a biological variable has led to a lack of knowledge about how to effectively prevent, diagnose, and treat a wide range of health conditions in women. This, writes Mazure, “leaves women and health care professionals without the tools they need to respond to conditions that affect women uniquely, disproportionately, or differently than they affect men.”

Mazure describes the work of the Initiative in response to this challenge and gives examples of meaningful actions that have been taken by federal agencies to make existing dollars work harder to advance women’s health research and improve the lives of women.

Three recurring themes of needed research goals culled from extensive listening sessions and discussions with stakeholders since the start of the Initiative also are reported. These focus on the value of addressing health disparities in women’s health, increasing interdisciplinary collaborations to address complex health questions for women, and reducing the time for critical research findings to be implemented. An example of an initial achievement of the Initiative with regard to these themes is ARPA-H’s (Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health) investment of more than $100 million to fast-track women’s health research discoveries into implementation.

Other efforts to bolster women’s health research are found in the description of President Biden’s Executive Order signed in March 2024, which directs the most comprehensive set of executive actions ever taken to advance women’s health.

Mazure concludes the Viewpoint with a powerful and inclusive call to action: “By working together and ensuring all of us – government, medical, and research communities; advocacy organizations; philanthropy; and the private sector – are doing everything possible to close existing research gaps in women’s health, we will advance our knowledge of human health and improve lives.”

In addition to serving as Chair of the Initiative, Mazure is the Norma Weinberg Spungen and Joan Lebson Bildner Professor of Women’s Health Research, professor of psychiatry and psychology, and Director of Women’s Health Research at Yale.