{"id":13822,"date":"2026-08-11T16:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T10:42:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/?p=13822"},"modified":"2026-08-11T16:12:47","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T10:42:47","slug":"why-the-period-gap-in-medical-research-is-so-big-explained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/why-the-period-gap-in-medical-research-is-so-big-explained\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the Period Gap in Medical Research Is So Big, Explained"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What you will learn about the <\/span><b>period gap in medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in this blog:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Women were excluded from medical research for decades, so many treatments and diagnostic standards were built around male bodies.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Conditions like endometriosis and PMDD are still underdiagnosed and under-researched despite affecting millions of women.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Menstrual and reproductive health research receives far less funding than many male-focused health conditions.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">With limited research available, period pain is often dismissed, minimised, or treated as emotional rather than physical.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Delayed diagnoses for conditions like endometriosis can lead to years of untreated pain, fertility issues, and emotional exhaustion.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tracking symptoms clearly and asking directly for investigations or referrals can help women advocate for better medical care.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here are some facts that explain the period gap in medical research:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Endometriosis, a condition that affects roughly 1 in 10 women, takes an <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.york.ac.uk\/news-and-events\/news\/2024\/research\/diagnosis-endometriosis-delay\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">average of 6.6 years to diagnose worldwide<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and in the UK some women have waited up to 27 years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">PMDD, a hormonal condition severe enough to upend lives, was only added to the DSM (the medical bible used to diagnose psychiatric conditions in the US in 2013.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the flipside, as of 2015 there were <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/perelelhealth.com\/blogs\/news\/nih-womens-health-research-funding\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">five times more studies on erectile dysfunction<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, which affects about 18% of men, than on PMS, which affects around 90% of women.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">None of that is an accident. It is the <\/span><b>gender gap in medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and it follows you around every time you\u2019re in your doctor\u2019s clinic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This blog post is about why that gap exists, what the science actually says, and how it shapes the moment you sit on that paper-covered table in the clinic and try to explain that your cramps are not normal. Because here is the uncomfortable part, a lot of doctors have simply never read a paper about your pain. What more uncomfortable? There often isn&#8217;t one to read.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>How Women Got Written Out Of The Research In The First Place<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For a long stretch of modern medicine, the default human body in a study was male. In 1977, the US FDA actually issued guidance that excluded women \u201cof childbearing potential\u201d from early-phase drug trials. The rule was framed as protection, partly a reaction to the thalidomide tragedy, when a morning-sickness drug caused severe birth defects in thousands of babies and made regulators wary of exposing any woman who might conceivably be pregnant. But slowly, it started including all single women, women on contraception, and women whose partners had vasectomies too. The female body was treated as too variable \u2013 because of hormone fluctuations \u2013 and too risky to study, so it mostly wasn&#8217;t.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>Blog continues after the ad.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/sanitary-pads\/?utm_source=Blog&amp;utm_medium=PageAd&amp;utm_campaign=BlogAds_SP_021225\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12418 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Blinkit_Masthead_SPSSP-300x210.png\" alt=\"Promotional banner on a coral background displaying Nua period pad boxes placed on elevated blocks. Text reads \u2018Zero Irritation, 4x Comfort. Explore Nua\u2019s Period Care Range.\u2019 with a \u2018Shop now\u2019 button.\" width=\"460\" height=\"322\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Blinkit_Masthead_SPSSP-300x210.png 300w, https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Blinkit_Masthead_SPSSP-1024x717.png 1024w, https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Blinkit_Masthead_SPSSP-768x538.png 768w, https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Blinkit_Masthead_SPSSP-360x252.png 360w, https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Blinkit_Masthead_SPSSP.png 1120w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 460px) 100vw, 460px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That ban wasn&#8217;t reversed until the NIH Revitalization Act of 1993 made including women in federally funded research the law. Think about how recent that is. If you are reading this and you are over thirty, the requirement to even study people like you is younger than you are. Decades of foundational research, the stuff that became textbooks and dosing guidelines and the instincts doctors are trained on, was built on bodies that don&#8217;t have cycles.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The fallout was real and measurable. Because so much early work skipped women, sex-based differences in how drugs are absorbed and metabolised went unstudied, which is how a sleep drug ended up being <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC12508397\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">dosed too high for women for years<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> before anyone caught it. These <\/span><b>male-centric medical studies<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> didn&#8217;t just leave women out of the data. They set the baseline for what \u201cnormal\u201d looks like, and women have been (incorrectly) measured against it ever since.<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is also why the basic biology of your cycle, the cramps, the flow, the hormone swings, stayed under-mapped for so long. For most of modern medicine, nobody was funded to look.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Being designed-around shouldn&#8217;t be the story of your body, and your period care shouldn&#8217;t be an afterthought either. Nua&#8217;s <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/sanitary-pads\/?utm_source=Blog&amp;utm_medium=PageAd&amp;utm_campaign=BlogAds_SP_021225\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">ultra-thin, rash-free sanitary pads<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are made for real, heavy, unpredictable flows, with a customisable subscription so the right pad shows up before your body has to remind you.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>How Funding Decides What Gets Known: Widening The Gender Gap In Medical Research Further<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Research needs funding, and funding reveals priorities. When you line up the numbers, the <\/span><b>menstrual health medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> picture gets hard to defend. A study in the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.liebertpub.com\/doi\/full\/10.1089\/jwh.2020.8682\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Journal of Women&#8217;s Health<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> analysed NIH funding against actual disease burden and found that in nearly three-quarters of cases where a disease mostly affects one sex, the funding pattern favours men. Conditions that hit women hardest were consistently funded below the level their burden would justify.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A few comparisons to confirm this are:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Premenstrual conditions<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> affect up to 90% of women, yet they <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.refinery29.com\/en-gb\/what-causes-pms\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">receive a fraction of the funding<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of erectile dysfunction, which affects under 20% of men.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Between 2019 and 2023, startups tackling erectile dysfunction and similar men&#8217;s health concerns <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/perelelhealth.com\/blogs\/news\/womens-health-research-gap\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">raised <\/span>$1.24 billion<\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, while endometriosis startups raised about <\/span><b>$44 million<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theblood.io\/blog\/the-gender-health-gap-why-womens-health-still-isnt-treated-equally\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One analysis<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> found <\/span><b>endometriosis receives less research funding than male-pattern baldness<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, a condition that causes no pain and no infertility.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is the engine of the <\/span><b>period pain research gap<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. When something isn&#8217;t funded, it isn&#8217;t studied. When it isn&#8217;t studied, there are no papers, no clinical guidelines, and no specialist consensus. The silence compounds. It is a big part of <\/span><b>why women\u2019s health is under researched<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and the effect snowballs across generations of doctors who were trained on whatever evidence happened to exist.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>To Truly Understand the Problem, Look No Further Than Period Pain<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Dysmenorrhea affects somewhere between <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/full\/10.1080\/03630242.2025.2469938\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">45 and 95% of menstruating people<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and severe cases can knock out work, school, and sleep. Each month the lining of your uterus releases prostaglandins (more on that <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/menstrual-cramps-and-prostaglandins-the-chemical-cause-of-period-pain\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">here<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">), chemicals that make the uterine muscle squeeze hard to shed that lining. That much is settled. Almost everything more specific than that gets blurry fast, which is remarkable for something that affects as many people as it does.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You&#8217;ve probably seen the line that period pain can be &#8220;almost as bad as a heart attack.&#8221; It traces back to one reproductive health professor repeating what his patients told him, not to a controlled study, because <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.snopes.com\/news\/2024\/12\/24\/period-cramps-heart-attacks-science\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">no research has ever actually measured period pain against heart attack pain<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc15.com\/news\/health\/doctor-period-cramps-can-be-almost-as-bad-as-having-a-heart-attack\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Researchers<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> are also openly unsure why some people are floored by cramps every month while others barely register them, calling the reasons still unclear. That uncertainty is the <\/span><b>period pain research gap<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> in a single sentence: the pain is real, it is nearly universal, and the science to explain it barely exists. This blind spot has a name, the <\/span><b>gender gap in medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and period pain sits very close to its centre.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">None of this means severe cramps are just a rough few days to wait out. Bad period pain has been linked to chronic pain conditions later in life, yet a <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalgeographic.com\/health\/article\/period-pain-menstrual-cramps-dysmenorrhea\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">landmark 2011 commentary in the journal Pain<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> was literally titled <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Don&#8217;t dismiss dysmenorrhea<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and it described how period pain had been virtually ignored by the pain research community despite how many people it floors every single month.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>Why Your Period Cramps Get Waved Off<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The research gap doesn&#8217;t stay in the lab. It walks into the appointment with you. Here is how <\/span><b>period pain dismissed by doctors<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> actually happens, point by point, and why it is rarely about one bad doctor.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>The evidence base is thin, so instincts fill the gap:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> When there are few papers on menstrual pain, a clinician leans on training and gut feeling instead of data, and gut feeling carries old assumptions about women exaggerating.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Women&#8217;s pain is rated lower even with identical symptoms:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In a study of over 21,000 emergency records, women were <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eurekalert.org\/news-releases\/1053656\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">less likely to receive pain medication<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> than men reporting the same pain level, and this held true whether the treating doctor was a man or a woman. There is an intrinsic belief that women are more tolerant, belief being the keyword here.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>It gets documented less:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> In that same research, nurses were 10% less likely to even record a pain score for female patients, which means the suffering doesn&#8217;t fully make it into the chart that drives treatment.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>\u201cHysteria\u201d never really left:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Reviews of pain care show women are still more likely to have symptoms read as emotional or psychosomatic rather than physical, an echo of centuries old assumptions about women\u2019s bodies.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Periods fall between specialties:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Menstrual symptoms can touch gynaecology, endocrinology, and pain medicine at once, so the issue slips through the cracks and no single field fully owns it.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Put those together and you get the honest answer to <\/span><b>why doctors ignore period pain<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">: not malice, usually, but a system where the data is missing, the bias is ambient, and the normalisation of women&#8217;s pain is so old it feels like common sense. The <\/span><b>hormonal health research gaps<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> mean even a well-meaning doctor is often improvising.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the days the world tells you to just push through, the least your pad can do is disappear into the background. Approved by gynaecologists and designed for zero irritation, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/sanitary-pads\/?utm_source=Blog&amp;utm_medium=PageAd&amp;utm_campaign=BlogAds_SP_021225\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nua&#8217;s Sanitary Pads<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> come with everything you need to have a comfortable period.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>What The Period Gap In Medical Research Actually Costs You<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>endometriosis diagnosis delay<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> is the textbook example. Because there is still no simple, validated non-invasive test, and diagnosis often depends on a doctor first taking the pain seriously, then referring onward, then waiting for a laparoscopy. Each handoff is a place to be doubted. A UK parliamentary group found <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC12629012\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">58% of endometriosis patients had visited a GP more than ten times<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> before getting a formal diagnosis.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Behind every statistic is a person who knew something was wrong and kept being told otherwise. When someone says their <\/span><b>endometriosis took years to diagnose<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, what they usually mean is that they spent those years being told the pain was normal, stress-related, or in their head, while the disease kept progressing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The same silence shows up in something as basic as how much you bleed. Heavy menstrual bleeding affects <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/female-blood-disorders\/about\/heavy-menstrual-bleeding.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">roughly 1 in 5 women<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, yet plenty of people never flag it, partly because if your mother and sisters bled the same way, soaking a pad an hour just registers as \u201cyour normal\u201d. Some of those heavy periods are the first visible sign of a bleeding disorder like von Willebrand disease, where the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC12925064\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">diagnostic delay for women can stretch past 14 years<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. It is hard to ask for help with a problem no one ever told you was a problem.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And it isn&#8217;t only endometriosis. The same dynamic shows up across PCOS, PMDD, adenomyosis, and chronic pelvic pain. Less research means fewer diagnostic tools, which means longer delays, which means more people quietly deciding the problem must be them. That feedback loop is the <\/span><b>gender gap in medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> operating on you personally, one dismissed appointment at a time.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>How To Be Heard At Your Next Appointment<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You can&#8217;t single-handedly fix the <\/span><b>gender gap in medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, but you can change the odds in your specific appointment.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Track before you go, in numbers:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> For two to three cycles, log pain on a 0\u201310 scale, days missed from work or school, products used per hour on heavy days, and any symptoms that travel with your period like nausea, fainting, or diarrhoea. Concrete data is harder to wave away than \u201cit hurts a lot.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Lead with function, not just feeling:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Say what the pain stops you from doing. \u201cI miss two days of work every cycle\u201d lands differently than \u201cmy cramps are bad,\u201d because it signals impact a clinician has to act on.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Use the words that trigger action:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Phrases like \u201cI&#8217;d like to rule out endometriosis,\u201d and \u201cwhat would it take for this to get further investigation?\u201d move you from comfort-and-reassure toward actual assessment.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Ask for it in writing:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> If you&#8217;re told the pain is normal, calmly ask them to note in your records that you raised it and the conclusion was no further action. People rarely have to write that down, and the request alone often reopens the conversation.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>Bring a second set of ears:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Research on <\/span><b>period pain dismissed by doctors<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> shows a witness in the room changes how seriously symptoms are treated. A partner or friend who can say \u201cI&#8217;ve seen her collapse from this\u201d adds weight you shouldn&#8217;t need but can use.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><b>If you&#8217;re stonewalled, ask for a referral by name:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> Request a gynaecologist or a specialist pelvic-pain clinic directly. You are allowed to decline \u201clet&#8217;s wait and see\u201d when you&#8217;ve already waited.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Every one of those moves is really you supplying the data and <\/span><b>reproductive health awareness<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that the research pipeline failed to generate. You&#8217;re doing unpaid work to cover for a system-wide blind spot, which isn&#8217;t fair, but it works, and it&#8217;s worth knowing how.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>The Gap Is Closing, Slowly, And You&#8217;re Part Of Why<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There is genuinely good news. Period pain is finally drawing serious scientific interest after decades of neglect. Funding for women&#8217;s health is being scrutinised more openly than ever. Plus, a generation of patients is refusing to accept \u201cthat&#8217;s just being a woman\u201d as a diagnosis.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The <\/span><b>gender gap in medical research<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> took fifty years of exclusion to build, so it won&#8217;t vanish overnight, but the direction has changed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Until the science fully catches up, the most radical thing you can do is keep believing your own body. Your cramps and your missed days are data. Your insistence in a doctor&#8217;s office, however inconvenient, is part of how the evidence base finally gets written. The next person who walks in with the same pain will be heard a little faster because you refused to be quiet.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><b>Disclaimer:\u00a0<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The content of this article is provided for general informational and educational purposes only and is not intended to constitute medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The information shared is of a general nature and may not be appropriate for all individuals or specific circumstances. Readers should not disregard, delay, or substitute professional medical advice based on the information contained herein.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you experience any symptoms, notice anything unusual, or have concerns relating to your health or overall wellbeing, you should consult a qualified healthcare professional. While every effort is made to ensure the information shared is accurate and up-to-date, Nua makes no representations or warranties, express or implied, regarding the accuracy, completeness, or suitability of the information provided and disclaims all liability arising from reliance on this content to the fullest extent permitted by law.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What you will learn about the period gap in medical research in this blog: Women were excluded from medical research&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":130,"featured_media":13823,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_editorskit_title_hidden":false,"_editorskit_reading_time":0,"_editorskit_typography_data":[],"_editorskit_blocks_typography":"","_editorskit_is_block_options_detached":false,"_editorskit_block_options_position":"{}","footnotes":""},"categories":[211,221,232],"tags":[2676,10],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13822"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/130"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13822"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13822\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13825,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13822\/revisions\/13825"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nuawoman.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}