Women's Health Research

Women's Health Research

Cyberseminars: Spotlight on Women's Health

Upcoming

1/27/2025 - 12:00pm EST
Women Veterans Health Care Sourcebook Vol 5: Key Findings

2/25/2025 - 11:00am EST
The Evolution of the COMFORT study (2014-2025): From Maternity Care Coordination to Doula Care to Military Toxic Exposures

Past Sessions

12/2/2024 - Updates on the State of LGBTQ+ Veteran Data and Research

11/19/2024 - An Evidence Map of the Women Veterans’ Health Literature (2016-2023)

11/14/2024 - Exploring Congressionally-Directed Medical Research Program Funding: Insights for VA Researchers

Women are entering the military in record numbers—they currently comprise approximately 20% of recruits, and it's estimated that by 2040, about 18% of the Veteran population will consist of women Veterans. To support the healthcare needs of current and future women Veterans, the Veterans Health Administration supports a comprehensive women's health research agenda, including significant contributions from VA's Health Systems Research (HSR). HSR has overseen the development of VA-wide and HSR-focused research agendas to advance science that includes or focuses on women Veterans to better understand their unique health and healthcare needs to ultimately improve their health and well-being; a summary of select HSR women's health research papers can be found here.

Women's Health Highlights

VA Research One Year Later: White House Executive Order on Women’s Health Research. This article from ORD Communications summarizes the VA’s response to the White House Executive Order on Women’s Health Research over the past year (Nov. 2023-Nov. 2024). The article summarizes work led by the new Women’s Health Research Integration Workgroup, such as developing funding opportunities and establishing new collaborations with other agencies including the Department of Defense and National Institutes of Health. The article also highlights efforts led by the Women’s Health Research Network (WHRN) to further grow and disseminate research about Women Veterans. Below are recent WHRN research snapshots, which are brief, non-technical summaries of research in various topics related to women Veterans’ health.

VA Women's Health Research Network (WHRN)

Women's Health Research Network (WHRN) supports and builds on VA’s capacity to examine and reduce sex and gender disparities in health and health care, with the goal of improving delivery of evidence-based care for women Veterans. WHRN is a national resource for VA HSR researchers and program office leaders to accelerate women Veterans’ health research and its implementation into evidence-based practice and policy where appropriate. Below are recent WHRN research snapshots, which are brief, non-technical summaries of research in various topics related to women Veterans' health.

WHRN Research Snapshots

Select VA Women's Health Research Agenda & Priority Papers

Included below is a selection of papers – both recent and historical – about research agendas and priorities for VA women’s health and health care. All links to papers are available open access.

Select Papers

Research Priorities to Support Women Veterans' Reproductive Health and Health Care Within a Learning Health Care System (2023). This article summarizes the research findings at the 2021 VA Reproductive Health Research Conference and describes research priorities to advance a learning health care system approach to reproductive health care in the VA.
Accelerating Generation and Impacts of Research Evidence to Improve Women Veterans’ Health and Health Care (2022). This editorial highlights the history and evolution of women’s health research within the VA, focusing on collaborations between researchers and clinical partners. The article also highlights health systems research topic areas where there has been significant growth in women’s health research including: mental health, reproductive health, rural health and access, primary care and prevention, chronic conditions, and post-deployment health.
State of the Knowledge of VA Military Sexual Trauma Research (2022). This paper provides an overview of the prevalence, adverse consequences, and evidence-based treatments targeting sequelae of military sexual trauma (MST), which has both physical and mental health impacts.
Accelerating Research on Suicide Risk and Prevention in Women Veterans Through Research-Operations Partnerships (2021). This paper reports on the process and outcomes of the Women Veterans’ Suicide Prevention Research Work Group’s strategic planning efforts to identify and fill gaps in suicide prevention research among women Veterans.
Substance Use Among Women Veterans: Epidemiology to Evidence-Based Treatment (2013). This paper discusses evidence-based approaches for treating women Veterans' substance misuse in primary and specialty care settings, along with potential research priorities to improve care in this population.
Using Research to Transform Care for Women Veterans: Advancing the Research Agenda and Enhancing Research—Clinical Partnerships (2011). This paper describes the history of women Veterans' health services research and provides an overview of the VA Women's Health Services Research Agenda, which was developed from the 2010 VA Women’s Health Services Research Conference.
Integration of Women Veterans into VA Quality Improvement Research Efforts: What Researchers Need to Know (2010). This paper describes women Veterans' health and healthcare use, notes how VA care is organized to meet their needs, and highlights national plans for women Veterans' quality improvement.
Toward a VA Women's Health Research Agenda: Setting Evidence-based Priorities to Improve the Health and Health Care of Women Veterans (2006). Recognizing the changing demographics of Veterans and the special healthcare needs of women, the VA Office of Research & Development sponsored the first VA Women's Health Research Agenda-setting conference to map research priorities to the needs of women Veterans.

VA Women's Health Research Systematic Reviews

Included below is a selection of evidence synthesis maps and systematic reviews on various topics in women Veterans health research. All links to papers are available open access.

Systematic Reviews

An Evidence Map of the Women Veterans’ Health Literature (2016-2023) (2024). This evidence map assesses the state of the literature of women Veterans’ health, finding that the number of articles more than double compared to the prior 8 years (2008-2015). The evidence map identified current gaps in the literature, including research on menopause, long-term care and aging, and women Veterans in rural settings.
Evidence Brief: Prevalence of Intimate Partner Violence/Sexual Assault Among Veterans (2021). Most available evidence points to intimate partner violence (IPV) and sexual assault experienced by women Veterans and perpetrated by men Veterans. However, future work is needed to obtain prevalence estimates of IPV and sexual assault that are applicable to Veterans of a range of ages, sexual and gender identities, racial and ethnic categories, and geographic contexts.
Reproductive Health of Women Veterans: A Systematic Review of the Literature from 2008 to 2017 (2020). This article aims to synthesize recent literature on reproductive health and healthcare of women Veterans, finding that most of the literature is largely observational.
Evidence Map: Reporting of Results by Sex or Gender in Randomized, Controlled Trials with Women Veteran Participants (2008 to 2018) (2019). This paper compares the characteristics of RCTs with women Veteran participants that did or did not report results by sex or gender. Additionally, the authors assess how sex and gender are addressed in research with women Veterans.
Systematic Review of Women Veterans' Mental Health (2014). This systematic review focused on women Veterans' mental health research published from 2008 to 2011. More research using interventional and longitudinal designs is needed, as well as research in certain topic areas including psychiatric disorders (e.g., schizophrenia), the effects of deployment on women Veterans' families, and strategies to address treatment access, attrition, and provision of gender-sensitive care.
Health Effects of Military Service on Women Veterans (2011). Focusing on the effects of deployment on reproductive outcomes, as well as post-trauma sequelae in OEF/OIF women Veterans, this report focuses on research in these two areas.
Systematic review of women veterans' health: Update on Successes and Gaps (2011). With growing attention to the needs of women Veterans in the early 2000s, a team updated the initial systematic review to add new scientific studies published between 2004 and 2008; they found that more research had been published in the past five years than in the previous 25 years.
The State of Women Veterans' Health Research: Results of a Systematic Literature Review (2006). This paper describes the results of the first-ever systematic review of the published literature on women Veterans' health research. It found that most research was descriptive in nature and focused on PTSD, sexual harassment and assault, the utilization and organization of care, and various psychiatric conditions. In contrast, experimental studies and studies about quality of care were rare.

Resources

Most of these resources are only available to VA investigators on the VA intranet

Recruitment

VA’s Women Enhanced Recruitment Process (WERP) Toolkit. The purpose of this toolkit is to provide researchers with resources and tips to optimize the representation of women at each stage of their study. The toolkit was originally developed as a collaboration between the Cooperative Studies Program (CSP) for clinical trials and the Women’s Health Research Network (WHRN), and has now been widely disseminated across research areas.
NIH Inclusion Outreach Toolkit: How to Engage, Recruit, and Retain Women in Clinical Research
Increasing Engagement of Women Veterans in Health Research (2022). This paper surveyed women Veterans, women’s health primary care providers, and administrators across five Practice-Based Research Network sites to identify ways to improve women Veterans’ engagement with research.

Funding announcements for women’s health and currently funded projects in the HSR Women’s Health Portfolio

Notice of Special Interest for applications on women Veterans’ health and healthcare- Available on the intranet only at vaww.research.va.gov/funding/docs/other/NOT-RD-01-WMH-Womens-Health-other.pdf (If you have VA network access, copy and paste the link into your browser.)
List of actively funded projects in the HSR Women’s Health Portfolio

Office of Women’s Health publications

Sourcebook Volume 5: Women Veterans in the Veterans Health Administration. This comprehensive guide published in 2024 details how the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) has expanded the quality and access to healthcare to align with the growth of women Veterans in the population. The Sourcebook covers an 11-year period coinciding with rapid VHA women’s health care delivery system advances.
Previous volumes of the sourcebook and other publications from VHA may be found at this link.

Additional, non-research VA resources on women’s health

Questions about the HSR website? Email the Web Team

Any health information on this website is strictly for informational purposes and is not intended as medical advice. It should not be used to diagnose or treat any condition.

VA Health Systems Research