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According to some forecasts, by 2025, an estimated one billion people across the world will have experienced menopause, roughly 12 per cent of the population. Despite this, education, support, and policy around menopause are lacking, and stigma is rife. 

Aiming to raise awareness, foster open dialogue and break the stigma associated with menopause, advocates from a cross-section of organisations have come together to launch the GCC Menopause Summit—the first of its kind in the region.

ESG Mena met with Sharon James, a wellness and menopause coach and one of the Summit’s co-founders, to discuss bridging the menopause knowledge gap, reframing the dialogue, and the Summit’s role in shifting mindsets.

Raising Awareness

Dubai-based Sharon James, who has worked in the women’s fitness and wellness space for more than 30 years, explained that the menopause wasn’t really on her radar until she began to experience it herself. 

Having become aware of her body’s changes and the impact those changes were having on her mood and energy levels, James started looking for answers and solutions to help manage her symptoms.

“I started doing some research on why [it was] happening. Was it my vitamin levels? Did I need my hormones checking? And as soon as I started to go into that rabbit hole, this word, perimenopause, kept coming up, and I didn’t know what it was.”

And James is not alone in this. One UCL-led study found that more than 60 per cent of people only begin looking for information once they start experiencing symptoms. 

She then began integrating menopause guidance into her work and providing her clients with information about the different options they have, from HRT to holistic therapy. 

“We all experience it differently, and we all deal with it differently,” said James. 

Indeed, just as each person experiences menopause differently, there are also cultural differences in how it is perceived and treated. However, while there is a movement towards more open conversations globally, stigma is stubborn. 

“I think here it’s been a little bit of a longer journey, and it still needs to be worked on; there’s a couple of reasons [including] cultural reasons, and second of all…the education and knowledge around it [weren’t] here.”

James also explained that many people associate the menopause with “getting old.” For this reason, she said, some try to distance themselves from it, only to be faced with perimenopause in their 40s and find themselves entirely unprepared.

Indeed, the menopause has three stages. Perimenopause is the phase leading up to menopause. On average, this phase lasts between three and four years, but everyone is different, and perimenopause can last for as little as a few months, or extend through to a decade. Menopause is the phase people enter when they haven’t had a period for twelve months, and postmenopause is the period after menopause and is entered 12 months after an individual’s last period. This phase can make up to one-third of people’s lives. 

“It’s about the education,” said James, adding: “I just think it needs to be recognised, understood and managed in various departments, from doctors to governments to [the] individuals [that are] actually going through it.”

Closing the Knowledge Gap

Menopause is not only misunderstood by those who go through it but also by the medical professionals who are tasked with providing care and treating its symptoms. 

Indeed, research indicates that medical professionals often lack adequate education and training on menopause, meaning that women can find themselves unsupported, misdiagnosed, and left with untreated symptoms.

Regionally, one recently published study of physicians from the Middle East and Africa found that almost 20 per cent (19.4 per cent) recalled having “no training” in menopause medicine, while 43.2 per cent reported having “occasional” training.

The same study found that just 28.8 per cent correctly identified the diagnostic criteria of menopause.

Historically, women’s health has also been both overlooked and understudied, with women underrepresented in medical research and clinical trials. It was only last year, for example, that scientists tested menstrual products with blood rather than saline for the first time, with significant implications for menstrual care. 

When it comes to the medical landscape, James said that things are changing, and those within the medical profession are “getting on board,” but there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done. 

Due to the knowledge gap that remains, James said that it’s also important to equip people with the tools they need to advocate for themselves within these settings. 

Shifting Mindsets

That said, the medical setting is, of course, not the only space where people encounter menopause-related challenges—menopause misconceptions, stigma and discrimination are also found in the workplace. 

Between 80 and 90 per cent of those going through menopause experience symptoms, including hot flashes, brain fog, anxiety, sleep problems and mood swings. Yet, the provisions to accommodate this in the workplace and training on menopause are often absent, and this subsequent lack of support has resulted in people leaving the workforce. 

According to James, communication is a key lever for changing this. 

One facet of James’ work is providing training to corporates to help them understand menopause and guide them in navigating and supporting it within the workplace. This training includes a session for male colleagues called ‘Men Take a Pause.’

“It’s about educating men on what menopause is, why women have it, what we go through, and what they can do to help navigate it,” James said. 

Alongside workplace training, James emphasised the importance of supportive workplace policy. 

Here, she highlighted the recent Menstrual, Menopause and Fertility Leave Policy introduced by Dubai-based PR agency TishTash, the first of its kind in the region. 

Headed by Natasha Hatherall-Shawe, one of the Summit co-founders, TishTash offers its employees up to six days of menopause leave per year, in addition to personal or sick leave. 

The agency also offers the option to work from home and removes the requirement for medical certificates for taking time off to manage symptoms. 

“It’s just open communication and open doors, that’s the policy really, that’s all it needs. It doesn’t need any big grand gestures because women don’t really want that; they just want to be heard and understood,” said James. 

However, again, within the workplace, James noted there’s still a way to go: “There’s a lot of work still to be done in the corporate world, but it’s slowly getting there.”

Navigating ‘Menowashing,’ Driving Change

The Summit, set to take place in October, is aimed at moving things along more quickly. 

Speaking about the catalyst behind launching the GCC Menopause Summit, James said: “I think [it was] not having that information myself when I was going through it.” 

Comparatively, James said that there’s now almost an “overload of information” on the internet: “There’s so much information out there that sometimes you get bogged down, and you can’t think about what’s actually right for you.”

Alongside this information overload, James outlined that as menopause conversations have slowly come to the fore, corporates have seized on it as an opportunity to sell products. This, James called ‘menowashing.’ 

Menowashing is a practice whereby companies market products with a menopause angle, such as supplements and moisturisers, in order to sell them at higher prices. 

“Menowashing [is] bringing all these products to the market that we don’t actually need, and [that] maybe don’t even work,” said James. 

James said that the Menopause Summit aims to cut through the noise and provide attendees with a clear picture.

“We’re going to have clarity of what it is, why we go through it, and what options you have, bringing the latest studies under one roof,” she said.

Adding: “The overall message from the summit is basically to understand [menopause], control it and don’t fear it, and then you can thrive through it.”

By Madaline Dunn, Editor, ESG Mena.