“What gets measured gets improved” is a principle that has driven progress in fields from education to economics. However, this guiding truth falls painfully short in the U.S. health system and urgently needs to update its approach to quality measurement for women’s health. The healthcare industry, especially when it comes to women’s health, must address this gap. Quality care metrics, like most aspects of healthcare, are shaped by a research landscape that has historically been centered on men. In fact, it wasn’t until 1993 that it became legally required to include women in clinical research studies. Still today, clinical studies disproportionately exclude women, fail to disaggregate data by sex, or ignore health conditions unique to women altogether. A system that measures healthcare performance against male norms overlooks vital differences in how diseases present, progress and respond to treatment in women, as well as conditions that affect women uniquely. This leads to three profound failures: a persistent dismissal of women’s signs and symptoms, the inability to identify and close gaps in women’s health, and the absence of measurement in areas critical to women’s health across their lifespan. Compounding this, research and data collection often fail to include racially and ethnically diverse populations.
Summary: The article argues that quality measurement in U.S. women's health is biased toward male norms, resulting in missed symptoms, unaddressed gaps in women’s health across the lifespan, and insufficient inclusion of diverse populations in research, with a call to update measurement practices to better serve women's health outcomes.