WHOLE takes a holistic approach to women’s health

Women go through several major reproductive events during their lifetime, such as when they start menstruating, become pregnant, give birth and later in life during menopause.

“These are very significant events that affect women. For most, everything goes well, but sometimes they suffer from pain or mental health issues. Examples include premenstrual distress, postnatal depression, menopausal depression, postnatal psychosis, endometriosis, pain during intercourse and vaginal tearing from giving birth. Most of these conditions may not be life-threatening, but they affect a great many people. Overall, they have a huge impact, not only on women's lives but also on their children and partners,” says Alkistis Skalkidou, Professor at the Department of Women's and Children's Health.

She heads the WHOLE research centre, which has been granted funding from Forte and the Swedish Research Council for six years, with the possibility of a four-year extension. In 2020, she also co-founded WOMHER, a centre for women’s mental health, at Uppsala University.

A broader initiative

WHOLE is a broader initiative with a clear research focus that also includes pain conditions, such as endometriosis. There are already research projects underway that are affiliated with WHOLE, such as the Mom2B project on postnatal depression and the UPIC project on young people’s mental health.

There are many ideas for future initiatives. For example, researchers want to collect self-reported health data and thoughts from women of different ages in a ten-year cohort, which will be linked to registry data. Important aspects are working in a transdisciplinary manner, together with people with their own experiences, and highlighting health problems, according to Alkistis Skalkidou.

“One example is why some girls feel unwell when taking the contraceptive pill, while others do not. Another is that many women going through menopause do not sleep well, which causes performance issues, but find it difficult to talk about it at work or seek help. These are things that really lower women’s quality of life but are not taken seriously. Our vision is to identify women who are at high risk and find ways to help them more, while also removing the stigma so that we can talk about it openly in society.”

Building a strong research environment

The goal is to build a strong research environment over the next few years and to jointly apply for major external research grants. At this early stage, around 45 researchers from Uppsala University and Karolinska Institutet are involved in the initiative.

“We expect to deliver research results through numerous publications as early as within the first two years, which will form a foundation for the future. But the goal is to invite international guest researchers and organise symposia and workshops for anyone who is interested so that we can build stronger projects that are even more interdisciplinary,” says Alkistis Skalkidou.

Collaboration with other actors

Although research is the focus of the project, it also involves close collaboration with other actors in society and patient associations. Together with an international advisory board, these provide important input to the researchers.

“Ultimately, we also want to contribute to changing policy, clinical guidelines and the National Board of Health and Welfare’s recommendations so that they are grounded in a stronger evidence base. In ten years’ time, we want to be an internationally recognised centre that people can turn to with both ideas and questions,” says Alkistis Skalkidou.

Annica Hulth