Endometriosis

2023 - 3 - 30

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Image courtesy of "The Conversation UK"

Endometriosis: black women continue to receive poorer care for the ... (The Conversation UK)

The condition causes tissue similar to the lining of the uterus to grow elsewhere – including on the ovaries, intestines, bladder and bowels. Symptoms can ...

This is due to an absence of quality research and the persistent misconception that endometriosis is a “ [white career women’s disease](https://www.routledge.com/The-Makings-of-a-Modern-Epidemic-Endometriosis-Gender-and-Politics/Seear/p/book/9780367078027)” and is [rare in patients of colour](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9066945/). [many aspects of a person’s life](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7800443/) – from school attendance and achievements, to relationships, career performance and financial earnings. [half of all cases of infertility in women](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18684448/) are potentially caused by endometriosis. [two and a half years later](https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.28.21261303v1.full) than white women. Another shortcoming in relation to black women’s endometriosis care is that the majority of available evidence comes out of the US. This discrepancy is staggering, especially considering there’s [no definitive evidence](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9066945/) endometriosis is more common in white patients. Much needs to change within the medical community to improve endometriosis and gynaecological care for black women. Research has also shown that patients of colour consistently receive [lower quality pain treatment](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1526590009007755) for many different conditions. [eight to 12 years](https://www.eshre.eu/Guideline/Endometriosis) on average for a diagnosis. And, in the UK, a survey found that [most black people](https://www.bmj.com/content/378/bmj.o2337) have experienced prejudice from healthcare professionals when it came to care – including practitioners dismissing their pain. The reason Sims chose not to use anaesthetic was, in part, because he believed [black people had higher pain thresholds](https://ugapress.org/book/9780820354750/medical-bondage/). The condition causes tissue similar to the lining of the uterus to grow elsewhere – including on the ovaries, intestines, bladder and bowels.

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Image courtesy of "Endometriosis Foundation of America - The Blossom"

Drug Developer to Receive EndoFound's Harry Reich Award (Endometriosis Foundation of America - The Blossom)

Drug Developer to Receive EndoFound's Harry Reich Award ... Stephen Palmer, Ph.D., who has dedicated more than 30 years to drug discovery and development, has ...

“I think the change that has happened with regard to endometriosis in the last five to 10 years is that people now recognize it’s more than just an endocrine disease and more than just an estrogen disease,” Palmer said. Palmer received a grant from the National Institutes of Health to continue the work he started years earlier at Senoro, and the project is now being executed at the Center for Drug Discovery at Baylor College of Medicine. “The key point that came from that early work at Serono was that endometriosis lesions in animals went away,” Palmer said. “We now have discovered a new compound that successfully causes regression of endometriotic lesions in our animal models,” Palmer said. At Serono in the early 2000s, Palmer and other scientists found several inflammatory factors involved in the disease process of endometriosis and developed proteins that worked well against it in animals. “Oftentimes, as a person in drug discovery, your life is in the background, so it’s nice to be recognized for a lifelong pursuit of novel therapies that treat chronic women’s health diseases.

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