Table 2 Initial recommendations, barriers or risk factors, potential solutions, initiatives, required tools, key performance indicators and potential road blocks for implementation of women’s brain capital across different life stages
Life stage | Barriers/women’s risk factors | Potential solutions | Initiatives | Required tools | Road blocks | Key performance indicators |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Embryo/fetus | Environmental toxins | Develop public health campaigns to reduce exposure to toxins | Prenatal care access programs and maternal wellness initiatives | Educational materials, mobile health clinics, training for health-care providers | Lack of funding, cultural barriers to health-care access, insufficient health-care infrastructure | Reduction in low birth weight, increased prenatal care visits, lower maternal cortisol levels |
Inadequate prenatal care | Expand access to prenatal care | |||||
Maternal stress | Implement stress-reduction programs for expectant mothers | |||||
Childhood and adolescence | Poor nutrition | School-based nutrition programs | Targeted geographical nutritional campaigns and sex/gender workshops | Skilled personnel, educational grants, training materials for workshops | Socioeconomic disparities, gender discrimination and stigma, resistance to cultural change | Improved body mass index scores, higher school enrollment rates for girls, increased awareness of gender biases |
Limited access to education | Scholarships for girls, increase education technology initiatives such as open courses targeting girls | |||||
Societal gender norms | Sex/gender equality workshops, increase gender equality representation in films and entertainment | |||||
Early adulthood (reproductive years) | Women hold the majority of caregiving roles | Telemedicine for reproductive health and women’s health more broadly, corporate policies for flexible work hours, improved childcare support and policies, violence prevention and support networks | Flexible working programs, brain health and mental health targeted telehealth platforms | Resource allocation for the development of telehealth platforms, HR policy frameworks, support hotlines and shelters | Stigma around reproductive health, corporate resistance to policy change, lack of legal protection in some geographical regions | Decrease in reported reproductive health problems, improved job satisfaction, reduction in domestic violence cases, increased rates of males in caregiving roles |
Women are still a minority in the labor workforce | ||||||
Gender-based violence | ||||||
Middle adulthood (post-menopause) | Menopause-related symptoms dismissed or underdiagnosed | Access to specialized clinics for women’s health, financial support for professional caregiver services, normalized discussions about menopause | Health-care system improvements to recognize and treat menopausal symptoms, targeted work policies for menopausal women | Resource allocation for affordable healthcare and professional caregiver services | Insufficient funding for health-care infrastructure, inadequate public funding for elder care and childcare services, persistent societal taboos | Improved health, higher social and professional engagement, improved job satisfaction |
Menopause stigma causing reduced influence in social and professional settings | ||||||
Increased caregiving role (elderly parents and adult children) | ||||||
Late adulthood (post-menopause) | Social isolation | Mental health awareness campaigns, community exercise programs, senior community centers | Dementia prevention programs for women, social prescribing initiatives to mitigate loneliness, innovations in elder-care models | Exercise equipment, public service announcement, community center facilities | Health-care affordability, psychiatric illness stigma, urban–rural divide in resource allocation | Increased access to long-term elder care, increased numbers of intergenerational communities |
Psychiatric and neurological disorders stigma hinders diagnosis and public policies | ||||||
Lack of subsidized long-term elderly care |