Women’s health and chronic pain
Weekly nuggets of pain science news and insight, usually 100-300 words, with the occasional longer post. The blog is the “director’s commentary” on the core content of PainScience.com: a library of major articles and books about common painful problems and popular treatments. See the blog archives or updates for the whole site.
A reader recently pointed out that I have almost no content that’s specific to women’s health. That is true, and I also have no current plans to improve on that significantly. This is partly a manifestation of the broad problem of sexism and other prejudices in healthcare — my own biases and blind spots have kept me from focusing on the topic, always with the convenient-because-it’s-true excuse that it’s really not my area of expertise. But my attitude has tended to ensure that it remains a topic I’m a bit clueless about!
I will try to fix that. Fortunately, I already know who to pay attention to:
- Dr. Jen Gunter, notoriously and fabulously science-based perspective on women’s health issues.
- Sandy Hilton and Sarah Haag, both physiotherapists specializing in pelvic health, and blog and tweet about it.
- Susie Gronski, Doctor of Physical Therapy, keen on men’s health issues but also blogs about women’s pelvic pain.
- Dr. Bronnie Thompson, an occupational therapist; Bronnie doesn’t focus on women’s health particularly, but she’s written more about it than me, and she’s smart as hell about pain and rehab in general.
- Joletta Belton is a female patient chronic pain patient who blogs beautifully about her experiences. Not “women’s health” specifically, but a terrific female patient perspective on chronic pain.
Some other experts and resources that are new to me, but recommended by some of the folks I just mentioned:
- InspireSante.org, several resources and experts here. Founder Erin Jackson is a former pelvic pain patient.
- Pelvic Guru, “your reliable source for all things related to pelvic health”
- The Integrative Women’s Health Institute
- Jilly Bond, Specialist Physiotherapy for Your Pelvis.
- Dr. Uchenna Ossai, a sex-positive pelvic health physical therapist and sexuality educator and counselor.
- Dr. Lorni Forner, Pelvic Health Physiotherapy.
- Dr. Melissa Farmer, Visceral Mind, a clinician-scientist with roots in sexology, pain research, and neuroscience.
- Tracy Sher, a physiotherapist specializing in pelvic pain and postpartum conditions.
- Fiona Rogers, Pelvic Floor Exercise: “the most up-to-date researched based information and quality products to assist you in recovering and maintaining your pelvic floor health.”