Two health foundations have joined forces to address systemic barriers that affect New Brunswick women’s access to health care.
The Saint John Regional Hospital Foundation has become New Brunswick’s IWK Foundation champion after a report found the system was failing women.
The report, published in 2025, surveyed more than 27,000 women across three provinces, including Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and P.E.I.
More than 6,000 respondents were from New Brunswick.
Some of the key findings of the report include that 74 per cent of New Brunswick women feel like the current health-care system fails to meet their needs, 75 per cent delay or avoid care due to fear of dismissal, bias or being labeled “difficult,” and 88 per cent state that they need significant changes in health care.
Saint John Regional Hospital Foundation CEO and president Shannon Hunter said they are working on initiatives.
“Every single element in this document are areas that we want to see improvements on and fund,” she said. “It is evolving the kind of role that we’ve played in the system, because it isn’t acute care, it’s not in the hospital, it’s primary care, it’s in the community, it’s information, it’s educating the next generation of physicians.”
She added the organization is working on its strategic plan and said women’s health will be at the centre of the strategy.
Hunter said investment in research will be one of their main focus, as the study found there was a need for more research on women’s health.
The report also found that heart disease is one of the top health issues New Brunswick women believe needs to be better addressed.
Hunter said this presents an opportunity for the Saint John Regional Hospital clinicians and surgeons to figure out how to better support women, as the hospital is considered a leader in cardiac care and heart disease.
However, she said conversations on overall solutions and initiatives are still in early stages.
IWK pushes for national bill
In the meantime, the IWK Foundation is working to drive change on a broader scale.
CEO Jennifer Gillivan said the foundation authored a national paper, The Case for Advancing Women’s Health in Canada, outlining the economic benefits of closing gaps in women’s health care. The paper will also serve as a supporting document for Bill S-243.
The bill aims to legally guarantee a national framework and strategy for women’s health in Canada.
The bill is still subject to a third reading and is currently undergoing review in the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science, and Technology,
Gillivan said other initiatives include raising funds to establish an applied research centre focused on women’s health and innovation and an educational podcast to educate women with credible information so they can better advocate for themselves when seeking medical help.
Jennifer Gillivan is the IWK Foundation CEO. PHOTO: Jennifer Gillivan/Submitted
Hunter added the Saint John Hospital Foundation will push for change before the national bill is passed.
She believes New Brunswick is small enough to create actual change.
“We can take from the learnings and these other models that are being implemented; we can raise the funds, and we can actually create new models of care,” she said. “I don’t think it’s complicated. I mean, every time I have a conversation with some of our clinicians, and even researchers, a lot of people are thinking this way.”
Gillivian agreed with Hunter, adding the Atlantic region is small enough to try things and “create change that can then bubble up.”
“In the whole Atlantic region, I think we have around two million people, give or take one million women. That’s a living lab. That’s doable,” she said. “You can create something in one province, scale it to three, measure it and then make it a standard of care, or an innovation across the country far quicker than you can in a massive city.”
“Our size for once in our lifetime is in our advantage.”
Hunter said the challenge now is to figure out how to get to the next step.
Survey participants hopeful for change
Survey participant Briana Cowie said she is glad to see organizations like the Saint John Regional Hospital Foundation focusing on women’s health.
For over 13 years, Cowie experienced severe chronic pain that was dismissed as normal period cramps.
It wasn’t until two years ago, after multiple visits to the emergency room and consultations with several doctors, that she found Dr. Craig Morton in Saint John, who took her symptoms seriously.
An MRI was finally ordered, leading to a diagnosis of severe endometriosis.
Endometriosis is a chronic condition where tissue like the lining of the uterus grows outside of it.
Cowie explained the MRI found that portions of her organs were tethered together with lesions, and it also found she had cysts.
After trying medication unsuccessfully, Cowie underwent surgery in 2025, which removed seven different growths from her body, as well as over 30 endometriosis lesions.
Cowie said after her surgery she is the most pain-free she has been since she was 18.
With the findings highlighted in the report and support from the Saint John Regional Hospital Foundation, Cowie said she feels seen and is hopeful other New Brunswick women won’t have to face the same challenges she did.
“It’s really substantial how I’m able to kind of go about and live, and sort of feel a better part of society because I don’t have this pain hanging over me anymore,” she said. “I really want every other woman in the province of New Brunswick to have as worthwhile an experience as I’ve had.”
“I don’t want them to push as hard as I have, and I know that they do. I really hope that this is a new awakening in taking care of women in our health-care system leads to some positive change.”
However, Cowie said beyond policy and systemic changes, for the switch to stick, cultural changes are needed.
“That we believe women is extremely important, and that we do not have a baseline where we accept women being in pain; it’s not acceptable,” she said.
Katherine Del Salto is a multimedia journalist originally from Guayaquil, Ecuador. She came to Canada in 2021 to pursue a journalism degree at St. Thomas University. If you have any story tips, you can reach Katherine at delsaltok@radioabl.ca.