Ten top issues for women's health

 

Women’s health has come a long way, but plenty of women’s health issues are still to watch out for in 2022. Women’s health problems are incredibly complicated in today’s world, as work, family, and fun, often get in the way of taking care of yourself. In this article, we will look at the top 10 women’s health questions and issues to be on the lookout for. We’ll address the top women’s health problems and solutions to those problems. 

Cancer:

Two of the most common cancers affecting women are breast and cervical cancers. Detecting both these cancers early is key to keeping women alive and healthy. The latest global figures show that around half a million women die from cervical cancer and half a million from breast cancer each year. The vast majority of these deaths occur in low and middle income countries where screening, prevention and treatment are almost non-existent, and where vaccination against human papilloma virus needs to take hold.

 1. Breast Cancer – The Most Common Cancers in Females in India

Breast cancer is undoubtedly the most common cancers in females in India. According to the National Cancer Registry Programme, approximately 1 in 22 women are at risk of developing breast cancer. The rise in breast cancer cases is attributed to factors such as late marriages, a sedentary lifestyle, consumption of processed foods, lack of physical activity, and hormonal imbalances.

Symptoms of Breast Cancer:

·         Lump in the breast or underarm

·         Unexplained pain or tenderness in the breast

·         Skin changes like redness or dimpling

·         Unusual discharge from the nipple

·         Change in the size or shape of the breast

Treatment:

Treatment for breast cancer typically involves surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and hormonal therapy. The treatment plan is tailored to the individual, depending on the stage of cancer and the specific type of breast cancer.

Reproductive health:

Sexual and reproductive health problems are responsible for one third of health issues for women between the ages of 15 and 44 years. Unsafe sex is a major risk factor – particularly among women and girls in developing countries. This is why it is so important to get services to the 222 million women who aren’t getting the contraception services they need.

Maternal health:

Many women are now benefitting from massive improvements in care during pregnancy and childbirth introduced in the last century. But those benefits do not extend everywhere and in 2013, almost 300 000 women died from complications in pregnancy and childbirth. Most of these deaths could have been prevented, had access to family planning and to some quite basic services been in place.

The most common direct causes of maternal injury and death are excessive blood loss, infection, high blood pressure, unsafe abortion, and obstructed labour, as well as indirect causes such as anemia, malaria, and heart disease. 

Most maternal deaths are preventable with timely management by a skilled health professional working in a supportive environment. 

Ending preventable maternal death must remain at the top of the global agenda. At the same time, simply surviving pregnancy and childbirth can never be the marker of successful maternal health care. It is critical to expand efforts reducing maternal injury and disability to promote health and well-being.

Every pregnancy and birth is unique. Addressing inequalities that affect health outcomes, especially sexual and reproductive health and rights and gender, is fundamental to ensuring all women have access to respectful and high-quality maternity care.

HIV: 

Three decades into the AIDS epidemic, it is young women who bear the brunt of new HIV infections. Too many young women still struggle to protect themselves against sexual transmission of HIV and to get the treatment they require. This also leaves them particularly vulnerable to tuberculosis - one of the leading causes of death in low-income countries of women 20–59 years.

Females often report gynaecological issues as their

 First HIV symptoms, includinlg:

• candidal vaginitis (thrush)
• bacterial vaginosis
• pelvic inflammatory disease
• genital ulcer disease
• menstrual cycle changes

'Seroconversion illness' usually starts around 2 – 4 weeks after you are infected with HIV. Symptoms may be mild and similar to a flu-like illness, or you may not experience any symptoms.

Since symptoms may be mild or absent, it can take time to be diagnosed with HIV

After the initial illness, people with HIV infection usually have no other symptoms, although the virus remains in the body and can be transmitted to others.

 

Sexually transmitted infections: I’ve already mentioned the importance of protecting against HIV and human papillomavirus (HPV) infection (the world’s most common STI). But it is also vital to do a better job of preventing and treating diseases like gonorrhoea, chlamydia and syphilis. Untreated syphilis is responsible for more than 200,000 stillbirths and early foetal deaths every year, and for the deaths of over 90 000 newborns.

In 1960s and 70s, bacterial infections such as syphilis, chancroid, and gonorrhea were the major STIs. Viral diseases such as herpes simplex and human papilloma virus infection were extremely rare. The spread of HIV infection with subsequent behavioral change since the 80s and 90s has resulted in significant alteration in epidemiological patterns. As like developed countries, there has been a significant rise in viral diseases and a relative fall in the incidence of bacterial infections. A high prevalence of bacterial and ulcerative STIs including chancroid was noted mainly in urban areas linked to migration and mobility and has strong associations with HIV acquisition and transmission.

Later studies showed a different picture, with evidence of large declines in STIs between the late 1990s and 2010 among key populations (sex workers, men who have sex with men, people who use drugs and prisoners); male bridge groups (higher risk men, e.g. migrants or transport workers, who have contact with both key populations and lower-risk populations); and pregnant women with an epidemiological shift from predominately bacterial to viral STIs.

Violence against women: Women can be subject to a range of different forms of violence, but physical and sexual violence – either by a partner or someone else – is particularly invidious. Today, one in three women under 50 has experienced physical and/or sexual violence by a partner, or non-partner sexual violence – violence which affects their physical and mental health in the short and long-term. It’s important for health workers to be alert to violence so they can help prevent it, as well as provide support to people who experience it.

Mental health: Evidence suggests that women are more prone than men to experience anxiety, depression, and somatic complaints – physical symptoms that cannot be explained medically. Depression is the most common mental health problem for women and suicide a leading cause of death for women under 60. Helping sensitise women to mental health issues, and giving them the confidence to seek assistance, is vital.

Noncommunicable diseases: In 2012, some 4.7 million women died from noncommunicable diseases before they reached the age of 70 —most of them in low- and middle-income countries. They died as a result of road traffic accidents, harmful use of tobacco, abuse of alcohol, drugs and substances, and obesity -- more than 50% of women are overweight in Europe and the Americas. Helping girls and women adopt healthy lifestyles early on is key to a long and healthy life.

Being young: Adolescent girls face a number of sexual and reproductive health challenges: STIs, HIV, and pregnancy. About 13 million adolescent girls (under 20) give birth every year. Complications from those pregnancies and childbirth are a leading cause of death for those young mothers. Many suffer the consequences of unsafe abortion.

Getting older: Having often worked in the home, older women may have fewer pensions and benefits, less access to health care and social services than their male counterparts. Combine the greater risk of poverty with other conditions of old age, like dementia, and older women also have a higher risk of abuse and generally, poor health.

When I lie awake thinking of women and their health globally, I remind myself: the world has made a lot of progress in recent years. We know more, and we are getting better at applying our knowledge. At providing young girls a good start in life.

And there has been an upsurge in high-level political will – evidenced most recently in the United Nations Secretary-General’s Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health. Use of services, especially those for sexual and reproductive health, has increased in some countries. Two important factors that influence women’s health – namely, school enrolment rates for girls and greater political participation of women - have risen in many parts of the world.

But we are not there yet. In 2015, in too many countries, “women’s empowerment” remains a pipedream - little more than a rhetorical flourish added to a politician’s speech. Too many women are still missing out on the opportunity to get educated, support themselves, and obtain the health services they need, when they need them.

That’s why WHO is working so hard to strengthen health systems and ensure that countries have robust financing systems and sufficient numbers of well-trained, motivated health workers. That’s why WHO, with UN and world partners, are coming together at the UN Commission on Status of Women from 9-20 March 2015 in New York. We will look again at pledges made in the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform of Action with a view to renewing the global effort to remove the inequalities that put decent health services beyond so many women’s reach.

And that is why WHO and its partners are developing a new global strategy for women’s, children’s and adolescents’ health, and working to enshrine the health of women in the post 2015 United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. This means not only setting targets and indicators, but catalysing commitments in terms of policy, financing and action, to ensure that the future will bring health to all women and girls – whoever they are, wherever they live.