Our Mission


Our mission is to eliminate health inequalities in Wales for Women, girls and people assigned female at birth. Click here to find the PDF of our 2022-2023 strategy.

The FTWW strategy infographic

Why do we do what we do?

Taboos around the health conditions that impact females – especially gynaecological ones – which:

  • prevent information sharing and open, honest discussion
  • see health conditions and symptoms ‘normalised’, which can delay help-seeking 
  • Result in education and workplaces not understanding or accommodating female health needs

Historical (and on-going) prejudice surrounding the development and provision of female healthcare for example:

  • females were not routinely included in clinical trials until the 1990s – even now, data often doesn’t break down the efficacy / side-effects of treatments by sex or gender. This means that women can be given medication that has never been tested on females
  • conditions that affect both sexes often have their treatment – and diagnosis – based on the male model. This means that the different symptoms women may experience are over-looked or dismissed (for example, heart disease / heart attacks or autism)
  • conditions which are often mainly / solely experienced by females tend to attract less funding for research or trials. This can also impact negatively on men; for example, auto-immune conditions have an 80% female prevalence and they attract very little funding, which means the 20% of sufferers who are male also suffer the consequences of this
  • when it comes to pain / admissions to A&E, women wait longer than men for pain relief, and are more likely to be given sedatives instead
  • many women report having their symptoms dismissed as ‘normal’ or ‘all in their head’; psychological in origin

Lack of knowledge on the part of the healthcare professionals

Lack of specialist provision in Wales, and a system which currently doesn’t routinely allow patients to choose and book those clinicians best able to provide care considered to be ‘gold standard’