The terminological preferences of many people living with HIV were articulated by Dilmitis and colleagues in the Journal of the International AIDS Society. The authors called for a vocabulary where “terms are clear, not clouded by ambiguity, … do not perpetuate or play into stereotypes, and do not hurt or marginalize the very people they […]
Latest articles
#DecolonisingContraception – The Importance of Preventing Unethical Practice in SRH and Learning from History
By Annabel Sowemimo Many times a week when I grab hold of a ‘Sims’ speculum (used in gynecology theatres across the world) I feel a shudder as I think of the legacy of J.Marion Sims, often nicknamed “the father of Gynaecology”. We can thank the many nameless Black American and poor women that Sims operated […]
Services for Sex Workers in London
By Millie Davies Access and engagement with healthcare among vulnerable groups is a particular interest of mine. Supervised by Professor Helen Ward from Imperial College London School of Public Health, and veteran in the field of sex workers services, I focused my Global Health BSc project on the identification of current sex worker services in […]
Physiological versus Synthetic Oestrogens for Bone Mineral Density in Premature Ovarian Insufficiency
By Eileen Chen My interest in female reproductive health and fertility led to this research project with Professor Jane MacDougall at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, to help guide treatment options for premature ovarian insufficiency. What is premature ovarian insufficiency, and why is it important? Premature ovarian insufficiency (POI) is a loss of ovarian function before the […]
Reproductive Health is a Public Health Issue
By Dr Sue Mann. Re-published with permission of FSRH. Dr Sue Mann and colleagues Monica Davison and Alison Hadley provide some background to the new suite of documents on reproductive health to be published by Public Health England (PHE). The documents will define the scope of reproductive health, provide a national overview of the current status […]
Women Suffer Most from Cuts to 17 NHS Operations
By Katherine Ripullone and Kate Womersley From 2019, the NHS will refuse hundreds of thousands of operations, as part of cost-cutting measures. What’s been less well publicized than the ‘17 blacklisted ops’, is how restriction and discontinuation of these procedures by NHS England will disproportionately affect women. This gender bias is not a new trend. […]
An Interview with Linda Pepper
Linda Pepper is the new patient editor at BMJ SRH. She has been a lay member of RCOG Women’s Network (WN) for 6 years, represented the WN on the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Health council and is a lay examiner and assessor for RCOG membership exams. She has dedicated her career to NHS patient […]
An Interview with Oskari Heikinheimo
Oskari Heikinheimo is professor of obstetrics and gynaecology at the University of Helsinki. He is also a new associate editor on the board of BMJ SRH. Kate Womersley, BMJ SRH’s social media editor, caught up with Heikinheimo to hear about the political attitudes around abortion and contraception in Finland, conscientious objection and exciting research underway in the field. […]
Screening for Trans People
This week, transgender patients have been encouraged by NHS England to enroll themselves in screening programs suited to their physiological sex, rather than their preferred gender. Currently in the UK patients are invited to sex-specific screening programmes (breast cancer, cervical cancer, abdominal aortic aneurysm) by their GP according to their registered gender. For many trans people, this is […]
Early menarche linked to increased risk of cardiovascular disease
(and so are early menopause, pregnancy complications and hysterectomy) Women who started their period before the age of 12 have an increased risk of heart disease and stroke in later life, suggests a study published in Heart today. Early menarche is one of several reproductive risk factors (as well as early menopause, pregnancy complications and […]