Yesterday 21/04/23, I had a fruitful and inspiring meeting with Senator Louise Pratt, her team and Robyn Clarke MLA. This meeting came about due to Robyn's support of my menopause work. As many of you may know, Samy medical group and I are opening a bulk billing GP practice in Harvey shortly, I plan to reach more women by mixing affordable, accessible general primary care with my menopause work. I'll use the practice as a training place for young doctors to be able to deliver effective holistic women's health, menopause and peri menopause care.
Most importantly, it's our time, menopause time, perimenopause time, it's time to talk menopause at the highest level! Menopause is not a taboo. Menopause is not a niche issue, it doesn’t take a genius to recognise that it will affect half of us in our lifetime.
Robyn Clarke MLA is hosting a talk that I’ll be delivering, on Thursday 1st June evening at @soroptimist international mandurah. To bring change, menopause dialogue must transcend political, gender, ethnicity and socioeconomic divide. I will talk about menopause diagnosis, how to get your doctor to listen to you and acknowledge your peri menopause and menopause symptoms. I will also demonstrate treatment options. You’re welcome to come be part of the dialogue.
Most of all, I plan on launching a petition page to lobby the government to subsidise HRT, menopause work policies, menopause sick leave, menopause uniform adaptation, menopause education in schools and in medical schools. We want to pressure GPs and the Royal College of General Practitioners(RACGP) to upskill GPs on menopause. All they need is an RACGP CONFIDENCE IN MENOPAUSE STUDY MODULE AND CERTIFICATION.
I don't know where to launch the page yet. It needs maximum exposure and validity. It needs to be a place where women can tell their story. At the close of the petition period, we'll take the signed petitions as evidence that women want change now, not in the next five years. It will have a woman's own voice! ANY IDEAS OF THE BEST PLATFORM TO USE ARE WELCOME.
Equally, if you're good at this sort of thing, your help is welcome. We must join together as women to effect change. This moment calls for reaching out across political, gender, socioeconomic, religion, ethinicity and any such thing that divides us.
I spoke to Senator Louise Pratt about bringing this change. I believe she has the tenacity and ability to get menopause agenda issues at the top of the government agenda. To continue to take the menopause agenda forward, we need women like us, to raise the issue, to break down taboos by making them no longer taboos, and stop making this an issue that nobody wants to discuss.
Menopause is like a submarine in the ocean, invisible, yet present, troubling yet unknown, forgotten yet afflicting 51% of the population, abandoned yet ever present. To turn its direction, it takes all of us as women to start campaigning and talking about menopause. The government will not do the job alone!
If we don’t take menopause seriously, we Lose out on all fronts. May it be talent and experience at work, drop in house hold income, unemployment, unnecessary referrals and tests. Or the ever rising health care budget due to preventable sequela chronic conditions like dementia, anxiety, depression, insomnia, osteoarthritis, osteoporosis and cardiovascular disease.
Why is there a huge lack of knowledge and communication on such an important topic as menopause? It feels like the last taboo. We talk about puberty and pregnancy and we know what to expect, but not so with menopause. Yet 100% of women, trans men and non binary who live long enough will go through menopause!
Equality and equity does matter!
#GoTellTheWorldMenopauseMatters