For years, the healthcare system has wrestled with the thorny issue of pre-existing conditions. Insurance companies would often exclude patients with these conditions, leaving them without access to essential care. These patients faced devastating choices: paying exorbitant out-of-pocket costs, foregoing treatment entirely, or hiding their conditions to obtain coverage – only to be denied when they needed care most. Some lost their homes paying for treatment. Others found themselves trapped in jobs they couldn’t leave, fearing the loss of insurance coverage. The system itself was the barrier to care.
Today, I see the women’s health innovation ecosystem facing a similar situation. We too are plagued by “pre-existing conditions” – systemic barriers that prevent us from building the solutions women desperately need. Just as the healthcare system needed fundamental reform to protect patients with pre-existing conditions, our ecosystem requires structural change to overcome its inherent challenges.
These conditions are well-documented: The chronic lack of research into women’s health, the persistent funding gap for female founders, the deafening silence around crucial health topics, and the stigma that still clings to women’s health issues. Like a patient repeatedly hearing the same diagnosis without receiving treatment, we’ve become experts at identifying these problems. Report after report lands on my desk, each one meticulously documenting the same challenges we’ve known about for years.
But here’s the thing: It’s 2024 and we’re past the diagnosis phase. It’s time for the women’s health ecosystem to move beyond merely acknowledging our challenges.
The question now is: How? And sadly I don’t have all the answers, but I know that now is the time for us to start asking different questions.
The past year has shown us unprecedented momentum in our space, with multiple forces working to create change. But there’s a missed opportunity here: While we’re seeing numerous initiatives and efforts, they often operate in parallel rather than in concert. Imagine the potential if we could align these forces – if we could transform this momentum into coordinated action.
This isn’t about individual products, companies, or initiatives anymore. It’s about fundamental reform of how we fund, research, and support innovation in women’s health. We need to reimagine how capital flows into this space. We need to rethink how we generate and share knowledge. We need to create support systems that understand the unique challenges of building solutions for women’s health.
Think of it this way: When healthcare reformed its approach to pre-existing conditions, it didn’t just change insurance policies – it transformed the entire system of care. Similarly, advancing women’s health requires more than just increasing investment (though that’s crucial of course). We need to rebuild the entire infrastructure that supports and adopts innovation in women’s health.
When healthcare systems finally began treating pre-existing conditions instead of excluding them, it transformed millions of lives. Similarly, by shifting our energy from problem identification to solution implementation, we can transform women’s healthcare.
And this isn’t just optimism speaking. We have the knowledge. We have the talent. We have a growing, interdisciplinary community who understand these challenges intimately. What we need now is to channel this understanding into tangible solutions.
Every morning, my inbox fills with yet another PR-baity report documenting the challenges we already know too well. The next chapter in women’s health innovation isn’t about writing these reports – it’s about writing prescriptions for change. It’s about building the solutions and organizations that will solve these long-standing issues. We’ve done the diagnostics. Now, it’s time for the cure.
So let’s stop talking about what’s holding us back and start building what will move us forward. The pre-existing conditions in women’s health innovation are well-documented. Let’s treat them.
