WHY WE DO WHAT WE DO

The statistics around women’s health are alarming:

  • 2/3 cases of Alzheimer’s disease are women
  • Alzheimer’s is the 5th leading cause of death in women
  • Women over 60 are twice as likely to develop Alzheimer’s as breast cancer
  • Women of color are at higher risk than white women
    • African American women at twice the risk
    • Latinas at x 1.5
  • Women make up 90% of lupus patients
    • 80% of all autoimmune diseases
    • 85% of migraine sufferers
  • Compared to men, women have a higher incidence of
    • Depression
    • Anxiety
    • Multiple sclerosis
    • Asthma

Why are women so sick? We don’t know. For decades, science only studied men, and as a result, we lack answers and insight into why women are diagnosed with so many diseases at disproportionate rates to men and lag behind in treatments as well

What WAM does to Help Bridge the Historic Gap into Research:

  • Has funded 46 WAM Research Grants at leading institutions around the country to help answer why women are twice as likely as men to develop Alzheimer’s disease.
  • Advocates for increased funding into research at the highest levels of government
  • Opened the first Women-based Alzheimer’s Prevention Clinic in the nation at Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health—where we arm women with customized lifestyle interventions to help them proactively reduce this risk for Alzheimer’s disease and research the unique biological factors that put them at increased risk.
  • Raises Awareness of Alzheimer’s as a Pressing Women’s Health Issue Via Polls and Published Reports starting with the 2010 groundbreaking Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Takes on Alzheimer’s, which in partnership with the Alzheimer’s Association, first revealed to the public that women are at disproportionate risk for developing the disease.
  • Produces Summits, Events, and Content to keep the community, leaders, and advocates informed about the serious consequences on women’s health of having not invested in understanding that we are unique and different from men.

Help us continue our work to change the future for women’s health by bridging the research gap.

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