Post-reproductive women\u2019s health is getting more attention \u2014 in headlines, in everyday conversation and in the medical community. Still, for many women, especially in the years leading up to menopause, evidence and support remain out of reach.<\/p>\n
A new primary care clinic set to open in Edmonton later this year aims to address that gap. Led by Faculty of Nursing<\/a> professor Colleen Norris<\/a>, specialized virtual care will focus on a period Norris calls \u201cthe most stressful time of a woman\u2019s life.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The project includes nearly $1 million from Alberta\u2019s new Primary Care Innovation Fund<\/a> to pilot the clinic and lead research focused on post-reproductive women aged 35 and older.<\/p>\n Norris notes that while private services exist, they can be expensive and are not always evidence-based.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cEvery woman should have access to publicly funded care that is based on scientific evidence,\u201d says Norris, who is the Cavarzan Chair in Women’s Health Research<\/a>, supported by the Alberta Women\u2019s Health Foundation<\/a>.<\/p>\n Many women experience symptoms ranging from anxiety, depression and brain fog to sleep issues, hot flashes and heart palpitations, yet there\u2019s little research or publicly funded medical treatment available, Norris says.<\/p>\n They will go to their family doctors saying, \u201cI just don\u2019t feel like myself,\u201d but if their periods haven\u2019t changed, reproductive aging may be overlooked as a cause of their symptoms, Norris says. She suspects their estrogen may already be waning or erratic.<\/p>\n \u201cEstrogen does eight really vital things for your vascular system, which is your heart, brain and your blood vessels,\u201d says Norris, who is associate dean of research for nursing and is also an adjunct professor of cardiology and public health. \u201cIt protects. It keeps the elasticity. It clears out the bad fats. It elevates the good fats. All these things we need for our vessels to work properly.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOur goal is that after the three-year pilot, this model will be picked up and it will keep going,\u201d says research project co-ordinator Maya Henriquez<\/a>, a registered nurse with a master\u2019s degree in public health. \u201cWe will be providing analytics to the government about patient flow, uptake of services, all of those things.\u201d<\/p>\n A focus on research<\/p>\n The team plans to open the virtual clinic in Edmonton by the end of this year, with nurse practitioners providing specialized primary care for women before, during and after menopause, and Norris and her team carrying out research projects.\u00a0<\/p>\n They\u2019ve already created a registry of 300 patients who are willing to participate in research and will recruit more once the clinic is open.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the most stressful time of a woman\u2019s life. Careers are ramping up, you may have young kids, you\u2019re taking care of parents, bills, medical things,\u201d says Norris, who is a member of the Women and Children\u2019s Health Research Institute<\/a>. \u201cWhen you\u2019re constantly stressed, you\u2019re always in fight or flight, the brain prioritizes the production of cortisol over estrogen. It\u2019s a double whammy.\u201d<\/p>\n One research project will look at a condition known as arterial stiffness<\/a>, which reduces the ability of the arteries to expand and contract. It can be measured by estimating the time it takes for blood to be pumped between the carotid and femoral arteries and is a good indicator of overall cardiovascular health.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWomen with poor vascular health are more likely to have hot flashes, night sweats and trouble sleeping, and we know that sleep deprivation is correlated with dementia,\u201d she explains. \u201cThe remedy might be estrogen.\u201d<\/p>\n Norris says hormone replacement therapy<\/a> was once not recommended because of an associated breast cancer risk, but it can now be tailored by dosage and delivery methods for individual patients, making it safer for many women.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got to stop saying all of these symptoms are normal and start figuring out reasons why it’s happening and how to prevent it,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n The team is planning to create a comprehensive, evidence-based education platform so women don\u2019t have to dig through misinformation to find what they need.<\/p>\n Norris will continue to build on her previous research investigating the impact of pregnancy<\/a> (the \u201cmetabolic equivalent of doing the Tour de France\u201d), pregnancy complications<\/a>, amenorrhea<\/a> (interrupted periods) and gender roles<\/a> on reproductive aging.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re trying to collect as much data as we can about women\u2019s entire experience \u2014 not just the clinical data but the social factors \u2014 and really start to look at the big picture,\u201d says Henriquez.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Post-reproductive women\u2019s health is getting more attention \u2014 in headlines, in everyday conversation and in the medical community.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1711,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,2369,84,392,2377,2376,2370,2373,2371,2374,2375,2372],"class_list":["post-1710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-colleen-norris","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-healthy-aging","tag-heart-health","tag-maya-henriquez","tag-menopause","tag-nursing","tag-perimenopause","tag-post-reproductive-health","tag-womens-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}