Building a stronger foundation for advancing women’s health 

Wellcome Connecting Science is committed to supporting the visibility of women in genomics, and this includes providing inclusive learning environments that play a catalytic role in fostering new thinking around improving women’s health research. Our scientific meetings foster discussion, knowledge exchange, and the development of collaborative relationships.

To mark International Women’s Day in March, we are sharing some highlights from our inaugural Women’s Health conference, which explored the complex challenges and opportunities facing scientists interested in researching sex differences in health and disease.

In January 2025, more than 130 delegates joined us in person at Hinxton Hall Conference Centre, on the Wellcome Genome Campus, UK, and a further 119 people participated online. In total, delegates represented over 42 countries, emphasising the global significance of this gathering.

The topic of inequality in research and clinical care for women is timely, but the aim of our meeting was to push beyond an acknowledgement of the gaps, and pave the way for a new era in gender-based medicine; one led by innovative and equitable scientific research methods.

The programme was developed around the whole lifespan of a woman, with sessions focused on defining global priorities for addressing disparities through the lens of sex-differences at the cellular level. What set this meeting apart, was the poignancy of so many personal experiences unexpectedly interwoven into the scientific presentations. These individual health stories, shared by some of our invited speakers, powerfully illustrated the importance of enhanced studies into many aspects of women’s health, giving extra gravity to the scientific focus of the meeting.

Each highlight shared below is linked to a more in-depth video where you can explore the scientific thinking, and in some cases lived experiences, behind the novel approaches driving innovation in this field. These videos reflect on sessions showcasing insights on a wide range of diseases and disorders that disproportionately affect women; and some of the conditions discussed at the conference also have implications for the health of men and non-binary individuals. 

The opening session on disparities provided a compelling backdrop for the whole conference, offering a broad context around the global societal and cultural issues that scientific research is both impacted by, and aims to address. 

From cultural perspectives on disease diagnosis and management and designing equitable health policies, to the impact of sex-differences on viral conditions and the lack of representation in clinical trials, this session set the background for the scientific discussion that was about to take place. 

Karen Nakawala, from Teal Sisters Foundation, Zambia, delivered a very personal account of the inequities in cervical cancer diagnosis and treatment, specifically from the perspective of women living in Africa. Her stark discussion on how cultural attitudes compound the issue of limited research capacity, was a thought-provoking insight into the global complexities to be navigated by researchers, policymakers, and clinicians.

Rachel Fowden-Hulme, from The George Institute, UK, shared insights from The MESSAGE (Medical Science Sex and Gender Equity) Project, a Wellcome-funded initiative defining approaches for better sex and gender integration into scientific research in the UK. MESSAGE has a direct impact on grant funding applications, requiring researchers to outline how sex and gender characteristics will be built into their proposed projects: a consideration for all scientists looking to increase their funding chances!

Abigail Goodship, from Imperial College London, UK, gave a detailed overview of her studies into the impact of female hormone cycles on the severity of viral-based conditions, including long COVID and myalgic encephalomyelitis. 

The session closed with a focus on the ‘Inequalities in enrollment of women in randomised controlled trials’, led by Deborah Lawlor, from University of Bristol, UK

From pregnancy and lactation to socio-economic factors and gender-specific disease perceptions, this session offered a fascinating exploration into the persistent gaps in health data equity. Through the lens of cardiovascular disease, Deborah offers different hypotheses about some of the potential reasons for low female uptake in trials, and proposes interesting gaps for further investigation. A fantastic overview for early career researchers to hear about opportunities to get involved in improving this issue.

Get a succinct overview of the women’s health landscape by watching the video below, which covers the entire disparities session.

Petter Brodin, Karolinska Institutet, Sweden, and Imperial College London, UK, delivered an excellent talk underscoring the importance of studying sex-differences for all genders. Referencing his work as a paediatrician researching dysregulated immune systems in children, Petter demonstrated how sex-differences impact the development of a person’s immune system. He emphasised the critical need to understand the relationship between sex hormones and immune responses, to gain clarity on why immunity differences exist between genders, and to enable the development of effective treatments for all. 

The so-called “menopause wellness market” is dominated by remedies, tinctures, and prescription-only hormone replacement therapies (HRT) that focus on managing symptoms. However, these treatments fail to address the health and wellness issues related to the varying scale at which women experience their first perimenopausal and menopausal hormone changes. 

Our first keynote talk, delivered by Anna Murray, from University of Exeter, UK, provided fascinating perspectives from her team’s work investigating the genetics of reproductive health, across a woman’s lifespan. This research highlights the vital importance of identifying biomarkers of menopause for understanding disease risk and prevention in women of all ages.  

The key takeaway from this session was that research into biomarkers offers huge commercialisation potential for precision medicine solutions that could provide women with more options, and effective treatments, before more complex issues arise. 

Anna’s work clearly highlights the gap between funding investment in menopause research, and the potential commercial opportunity to raise the standards of healthcare for women; particularly for those who experience hormonal transitions into menopause outside of the average age range. 

Explore the genetics of reproductive health through Anna’s insights by watching the video below.

For Connecting Science, one of the advantages of delivering conferences at our flagship home, on the Wellcome Genome Campus, is our proximity to the science led by our research colleagues at Wellcome Sanger Institute, UK. 

One such example, is the pioneering work being led by Roser Vento-Tormo, Wellcome Sanger Institute, UK, on developing The Human Reproductive Cell Atlas across the lifespan, using single-cell and spatial methods. 

Roser kindly delivered a talk at the conference highlighting how this innovative atlas significantly deepens our understanding of how the female reproductive tissue develops; a process that underpins many reproductive conditions, but has been largely unexplored so far.  

She also mentioned her study focusing on the adult endometrium in collaboration with the Nuffield Department of Women’s and Reproductive Health, University of Oxford, UK. Insights from this research were published in the August 2024 issue of Nature Genetics titled ‘An Integrated Single-Cell Reference Atlas of the Human Endometrium’. They provide invaluable knowledge for researchers investigating tissue processes in conditions such as endometriosis. This research is particularly significant because, until now, these diseases have not been examined at the cellular and molecular levels, which has hindered the identification of diagnostic and therapeutic targets.

Linda Griffith, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cambridge (MIT), USA, also gave a stunning presentation at the conference, detailing how her pioneering work on liver disease using living patient avatars has inspired new approaches to endometriosis modelling. 

Her team at MIT have been developing living patient avatars for over 30 years; now they are working closely with the Vento-Tormo lab to advance these novel avatars into models that represent real-world reproductive health problems, so they can be used to study the human endometrium in detail.

The strength of this partnership is driving the development of a transformative model for studying reproductive biology, enabling deeper insights into what happens to human tissue in patients with endometriosis.This offers life-changing potential for the diagnosis and treatment of this debilitating condition, by creating pathways for humanising and personalising the drug development process. 

Explore the origins of this innovative project, and gain personal insights on the current state of women’s health by watching the video below.

Women’s health is an emotive subject, even when the focus is on the science, but this year’s conference has successfully demonstrated that scientific thought is already shifting the dial on what has been a disheartening landscape for those impacted by the gaps in gender and sex-based medicine.

The insights, innovation, and commercial potential highlighted at this conference, illuminate the possibilities available if we continue to foster genomics learning and training; high-quality, gender and sex-based research; and global collaborations. The work already undertaken by this incredible community promises revolutionary enhancements for disease modelling, drug development, and the clinical treatment of women.

Our goal as the learning and training capacity of a world-renowned research institute, is to nurture momentum in this space by joining up the discoveries with the knowledge exchange opportunities.

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Human endometrial map uncovers hidden health clues, a Wellcome Sanger Institute blog article.