S7E5 Women's Health: Improving Access, Diagnosis and Outcomes Through Imaging

Thank you so much for having me here and to talk about such an important topic.

I've been a GP and a doctor for 25 years in the NHS and the vast majority of that 20 years or so has been in women's health.

I had the privilege of setting up my own women's health service now called Women's Health Hub about 10 years ago.

And we've upskilled the primary care team, GPs, nurses, pharmacists to deliver as much as we can off off site of a hospital.

And so we were very ambitious in what we did.

But thankfully, we've been able to prove that concept.

And we've been going for 10 years or so, seeing about 15,000 women per annum.

And so really diagnostics has been a very much a key part of running community clinics for women.

And I'm keen to keep that momentum going and share the knowledge that we've we've had over the years.

Great, thank you.

And over to you, Anna, as well, if you can just tell us a bit about yourself.

Yeah, thanks, Sally.

And thanks for inviting me to join you as well.

I've spent about 20 years in medtech, but in 2022, I made the move to Hologic to focus specifically on women's health.

And honestly, I don't think I realised when I joined just how dedicated this company was to creating change for women.

So Herlogic's entire philosophy is built around what they call the science of sure, which is the idea that every technology they develop, every clinical claim that's made has to be grounded in rigorous data and evidence.

And it genuinely shapes how they measure the real world impact of their products on women's health outcomes.

And that really matters enormously to me.

I work in market access now.

And when you look at the broader landscape, women's health has historically attracted a fraction of the research and funding and NHS investment that men's health receives.

And that gap has real consequences for women.

So a large chunk of my focus now is on screening and symptomatic breast services and specifically things like making sure the breast screening programme gets the funding and modernisation that it needs to continue to get it right.

So it's equitable and consistent and uses the best available technology so we can really move the needle on survival rates.

And that's what I really enjoy fighting for.