Policy briefs – Gender and Chronic disease
All of our policy briefs are completing a major revision of their look and feel. This is intended to achieve the following:
- Easier to read by using appropriate text presentations.
- Colour used to emphasise paragraphs and sections.
- Larger images used so they are easier to read.
- Designed to have more readable text so users and others can best share our information.
- Drop all information and imagery that was superfluous or presented using “localised” approaches was edited out, e.g. using dashes to form “new terms”, that was confusing to our readers, especially non English readers.
- We continuously seek comments from our users to help improve and increase the value of our presentations.
Our texts are now designed to make “on screen reading” easier with no columns, no scrolling back and forwards while reading from a screen. Images where we could recover the originals have been increased size to assist readers to clearly see, use and interpret the valiable data they contain.
Colour is used to help break up documents, to aid reading. Fonts help highlight document paragraphs, sections etc. making them easier to find.
We try, to limit text to 14 words per line to assist and improve reading and assist retention. You can change sizes of text in your own browser, as you wish.
Reference indexes and content have been increased in size to aid readability. Identification and confirmation of links has been improved by a move to one style, i.e. Arabic numerals which are in common everyday use in Europe and beyond by removing Roman numeral notation which slows down the reader or creates additiional difficulties.
We use larger fonts to display this information. As these are not initially distributed in a paper format, colour is used to highlight sections etc., helping readers to easily find their areas of interest more easily.
Some images have had their download size reduced by having their background colours removed if apporpriate. Reduced file sizes reduce printing costs, time and use less ink, so are cheaper and more eco friendly when reporducing. It means cheaper, faster print especially if multiple copies are needed and a small step to reduce our environmental impact.
What are EIWH policy briefs?
They are sets of short nut comprehensive documents on specific health related issues or diseases. Our policy brief’s are intended to present findings and recommendations from research to project into wider, non expert audiences. They help by providing:
• A medium to explore issues and refine lessons learned from research.
• Vehicles that provide key policy and policy development advice.
Each EIWH policy brief tries to be:
• Reasonable in length and a stand alone document covering the key facts and needs.
• Focus on one major health topic or sub topic and its potential for development
• Between 2 and 10 pages long, using normally around 4000 words.
They are intended to inform a wide audience of citizens from decision makers to health consumers with interests in health, specific diseases or social issues that can effect or impact on health, health policy, its resources used to provide or deliver better health for all.
The European Institute of Women’s Health intends when it has resources available, to regularly publish information in various formats, e.g. newsletters, reports, presentations designed to summarise or inform about our Institute’s activities both formally and informally. To do this, we use a number of information tools i.e. in relation to policy we use Policy Briefs.
Policy Briefs are intended to provide most, if not all, of the major information points needed by policy or decision makers and also the wide audience of interested citizens to help them unde+rstand and so progress specific issues related in health for example, gender or chronic disease areas.
Our policy briefs below have undergone a design and usability upgrade and are now being made available again. They fall into 2 main groups.
Chronic disease policy briefs:
Chronic diseases are the leading cause of illness and death in the EU. These diseases create a heavy burden for EU citizens and healthcare systems. With ageing populations and lifestyle changes, chronic diseases are increasingly affecting EU citizens now and in the future. Chronic diseases can have different effects on all individuals.
Gender largely impacts susceptibility, prevention, diagnosis and treatment of chronic diseases. As a result, it is imperative that people across the EU are aware of how gendered exposures and vulnerabilities influence chronic diseases.
The impact of gender on chronic diseases have been under studied and under discussed throughout the EU. The European Institute of Women’s Health is generating policy briefings and/or fact sheets on a variety of health topics.
Our policy briefings will be succinct, use simple language to help reduce health literacy while increasing awareness at regional and EU levels. Policy briefings can describe how gender impacts on various chronic diseases and provide policy recommendations to highlight issues with policymakers, stakeholders, and EU citizens. The EIWH intends to generate, publish, and distribute more briefings in the coming years.
Chronic diseases include but not limited to cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, cancer, respiratory tract and autoimmune diseases (such as Lupus), arthritis, musculoskeletal and osteoporosis specifically.
Our current list of Chronic disease policy briefs include:
- Women and Alcohol (updated 2022)
- Women and Smoking (updated 2022)
- Pregnancy and Smoking (updated 2022)
Gender Policy Briefs:
Our participation in ENGENDER, a DG Health and Consumer funded project, completed in 2012.
Part of our activity is to increase awareness and knowledge of all stakeholders, especially policy makers, politicians, researchers, health NGOs in and outside the health sector about effective policies and programmes to achieve gender equity in health.
Six policy briefings were produced by us for the ENGENDER partnership. These were based on an analysis of the ENGENDER good practice database for promoting gender equity in health.
The briefs were designed to provide practical examples on each policy area, informing policymakers of best practice models for promoting gender equity in policy development in each of the 6 policy areas as follows:
The EIWH policy briefs developed by the EIWH for the EUgenmed project:
