UK employment policy is beginning to catch up with the reality of women’s health at work, with initiatives such as the mandatory Menopause Action Plans from 2027 for larger employers representing important progress. However, menopause is only one part of a much broader challenge. Women’s health extends far beyond menopause, encompassing menstrual, gynaecological, fertility, plus mental and cognitive health challenges that can influence workforce participation and retention. If employers are serious about closing the gender health gap, workplace health strategies must extend beyond menopause alone. This article outlines what employers need to know to support women’s health at every stage, and the practical steps they can take.
The Policy and Standards Landscape Is Evolving
Policy and professional standards increasingly recognise the importance of women’s health at work. Under the Employment Rights Act 2025, employers with 250 or more employees can voluntarily publish Gender Equality Action Plans alongside gender pay gap reports, including menopause support measures, expected to become mandatory from spring 2027.
The British Standards Institution published BS 30416:2023, the world’s first workplace standard on menstruation, menstrual health and menopause, covering inclusive language, manager training, flexible working, and facilities. BS 30416 has also informed ISO 45010, an international standard in development aiming to provide a global framework for supporting women at work. This signals a broader shift: women’s health is increasingly recognised as a workplace equality and retention issue, not solely a personal or clinical matter.
Menopause Remains a Major Workplace Issue
Menopause and perimenopause can affect mental health, cognition, and physical wellbeing. Symptoms including fatigue, anxiety, brain fog, and hot flushes have a well-documented impact on work performance and participation (Menopause Mandate, 2025).
Research by the Fawcett Society found that one in ten employed women surveyed had left a job due to menopause symptoms (Fawcett Society, 2022), however this figure should be interpreted with care: the survey sampled self-identified symptomatic women aged 45–55, and may not represent all women of menopausal age (Paull, 2025). Nonetheless, unmanaged symptoms contribute to reduced hours, stalled progression, and attrition, particularly among experienced mid-career professionals.
Employers cannot provide clinical care, but can strengthen preventive health strategies, occupational health referral pathways, and appointment flexibility, and ensure managers respond appropriately. Focusing only on menopause risks missing the wider picture of women’s health across the lifespan.
Menstrual and Gynaecological Health
Menstrual and gynaecological health remains one of the most overlooked aspects of workplace wellbeing. Conditions including severe period pain, heavy menstrual bleeding, endometriosis, fibroids and ovarian cysts are estimated to cost the UK economy almost £11 billion annually through sickness absence alone (NHS Confederation et al., 2024).
Heavy menstrual bleeding affects around one third of women of reproductive age and is a leading cause of iron deficiency (Benson et al., 2025). Even without anaemia, iron deficiency can impair concentration, increase fatigue, and affect workplace performance (Munro et al., 2023).
Endometriosis affects around 1.5 million women in the UK and is associated with chronic pain, fatigue and heavy bleeding. Around one in six women leave work because of their symptoms, while diagnosis still takes almost nine years on average (Endometriosis UK, 2024). Many employees delay requesting adjustments until diagnosis, despite reasonable adjustments under the Equality Act 2010 not necessarily requiring one if the condition meets the legal definition of disability.
Workplace conversations should also include fertility treatment, pregnancy loss, PMDD, PMOS (formerly PCOS), pregnancy-related complications and perinatal mental health: around one in four women experience a mental health problem during pregnancy or within the first year after birth, and fertility treatment and pregnancy loss remain highly stigmatised despite their emotional, physical and occupational impacts (Wilkinson et al., 2022). This matters at scale: over 3.5 million people in the UK are affected by fertility problems, mostly in employment, and over a third have considered leaving their job as a result (Fertility Network UK, 2021); separately, 74% going through fertility treatment feel the topic isn’t valued by their employer (Fertility Matters at Work, 2022).
Menstrual health, fertility, postpartum recovery and menopause aren’t separate issues, they’re stages of one continuum shaping working life, and employers who embed them within wider policy, backed by practical manager guidance and clear signposting, build more supportive and more productive workplaces. This then becomes a governance matter rather than a wellbeing one, with a moral, legal and economic case behind it, and it needs buy-in at every level, including active male allyship, to work.
Cognitive & Mental Health Require a Preventive Approach
Mental health and cognitive health are related but distinct. Mental health covers emotional and psychological wellbeing; cognitive health covers attention, memory, executive functioning and mental clarity, all of which underpin performance. Perimenopause is increasingly recognised as a period of cognitive and psychological change, with anxiety, low mood and brain fog often compounded by workplace stress and caring responsibilities.
Cognitive difficulties can affect confidence and wellbeing even without a diagnosed mental health condition, yet cognitive health remains largely absent from workplace strategies. A study of over 25,000 adults found 28% reported brain fog, with women significantly more affected than men (Alim-Marvasti et al., 2024). Similar symptoms occur during pregnancy, postpartum recovery, chronic stress, sleep disruption, long COVID and neurodivergence. Women also carry a disproportionate share of unpaid caring responsibilities, and evidence links intensive caring to faster cognitive decline, an often-overlooked workplace risk.
Women consistently report higher stress and burnout than men, frequently driven by organisational conditions such as excessive workloads, understaffing, poor psychological safety and weak manager support. Prevention therefore requires organisational action alongside supportive management and flexible working.
What Good Practice Looks Like
Employers don’t need to become experts in women’s health, but they can reduce stigma and strengthen support through practical action:
- Improve manager capability: Extend training beyond menopause to menstrual health, fertility, and cognitive and mental wellbeing. Line managers are increasingly expected to hold sensitive health conversations, often without additional time or training, a pressure sometimes described as the “squeezed middle.” Toolkits and reference guides can help managers respond confidently without becoming health specialists themselves.
- Increase health literacy: Evidence-based education reduces stigma and encourages earlier help-seeking.
- Review HR systems: Reproductive and gynaecological health issues can have a cumulative impact across a woman’s working life, not just in isolated absence episodes. Recruitment, performance management, and promotion processes should also be reviewed to avoid disadvantaging women.
- Adopt a preventive approach: Healthy sleep, physical activity, nutrition, stress management and flexible working reduce symptom burden.
- Strengthen support pathways: Clear occupational health referral routes, aligned with BS 30416:2023, provide a structured framework.
Moving Beyond Compliance
The growing policy focus on menopause is genuine progress, but the wider gender health gap reflects structural barriers beyond a single life stage. Women experiencing menopause, endometriosis, reproductive challenges, anxiety, or burnout are present across every sector and level of seniority. These issues rarely occur in isolation. Conditions can accumulate across a career, and their combined effects are easily missed if organisations track only single absence episodes, quietly disadvantaging women in recruitment and promotion long afterwards.
The opportunity for employers is to move beyond compliance, reflecting women’s health across the employee lifecycle, not just absence management. A preventive, evidence-informed approach supports better wellbeing, retention and sustainability.
Disclaimer: This document uses the term “women” to refer to individuals affected by the menstrual, gynaecological, and reproductive health issues discussed, including menstruation, endometriosis, fertility treatment, pregnancy, and menopause. We recognise that language in this area is evolving and, in some contexts, contested. Following the UK Supreme Court’s ruling in For Women Scotland Ltd v The Scottish Ministers [2025] UKSC 16, the terms “man,” “woman,” and “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 refer to biological sex, though further statutory guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission is still pending at the time of writing. This document focuses on health conditions linked to biological sex characteristics and is not intended to make a wider statement on gender identity. Organisations should seek their own legal advice on how this guidance applies to their specific policies.
References
Alim-Marvasti, A., Ciocca, M., Kuleindiren, N., Lin, A., Selim, H. and Mahmud, M. (2024) ‘Subjective brain fog: a four-dimensional characterization in 25,796 participants’, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 18. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3389/fnhum.2024.1409250
Benson, G. et al. (2025) ‘Greater prevalence of anaemia and heavy menstrual bleeding reported in women of reproductive age in the United Kingdom compared to Australia’, British Journal of Haematology. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1111/bjh.20075
British Standards Institution (BSI) (2023) BS 30416:2023 Menstruation, menstrual health and menopause in the workplace. Guide. London: BSI.
Endometriosis UK (2024). Endometriosis facts and figures. Available at: https://www.endometriosis-uk.org/endometriosis-facts-and-figures
Fawcett Society (2022). Menopause and the Workplace. London: Fawcett Society. Available at: Menopause and the Workplace
Fertility Network UK (2021). Fertifa / Fertility Network UK survey summary: https://www.fertifa.com/post/fertility-network-survey
Fertility Matters at Work (2022). HR News coverage of the FMAW 2022 report. Full report available at: https://fertilitymattersatwork.com/report/
Menopause mandate (2025). Available at: https://www.menopausemandate.com/news & https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2025-10-16/debates/18427475-7184-4646-BDC3-41CEFE57D5DB/WorldMenopauseDay
Munro, M.G. et al. (2023) ‘Heavy menstrual bleeding, iron deficiency, and iron deficiency anemia: Framing the issue’, International Journal of Gynecology and Obstetrics, 162(S2), pp.3–11. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1002/ijgo.14943
NHS Confederation, CREATE Health Foundation and London Economics (2024) Women’s health economics: Investing in the 51 per cent. London: NHS Confederation. Available at: https://www.nhsconfed.org/publications/womens-health-economics
Paull, G. (2025) ‘The problem of addressing menopause in the workplace without rigorous evidence’, LSE Business Review, 29 July. Available at: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/businessreview/2025/07/29/the-problem-of-addressing-menopause-in-the-workplace-without-rigorous-evidence/
Wilkinson, K., Mumford, C. & Carroll, M. (2022) ‘Complex Fertility Journeys and Employment: How workers navigate fertility challenges, including fertility treatment, alongside work and employment, and what employers can do to help’. Available at: https://www.mmu.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2022-06/ComplexFertilityJourneysResearchProjectReport.pdf
Author Profiles
Dr Suzanne Barr MEd RD is a preventive health specialist with more than 20 years’ experience across healthcare and academia. She is Director of HercuWise (www.hercuwise.com), which provides evidence-based, flexible workplace health services, including an interactive workplace health toolkit and women’s health at work resources. Her background in women’s health includes her PhD exploring lifestyle strategies for the management of PMOS and post-doctoral work on gestational diabetes prevention. She also holds a Visiting Senior Research Fellow position at King’s College London.
Dr Krystal Wilkinson is an Associate Professor in Human Resource Management at Manchester Metropolitan University and Chartered Member of the CIPD. Her research focuses the work-life interface; health and wellbeing at work and tackling inequalities. Recent studies have focused on women’s reproductive health in the workplace; maternity management; complex fertility journeys; and perinatal mental ill-health. She is an Executive Committee member of the Society of Occupational Medicine network on Women’s Health at Work; and Ambassador for the Maternal Mental Health Alliance; and Co-Founder of The Parent Experience, which provides bespoke research on the lived reality of parental journeys in the workplace
Naomi Glover MSc, FRSPH is a workplace cognitive health specialist and applied neuroscientist with over 20 years’ experience across the public and private sectors. Her background in organisational leadership, learning and development includes work with organisations including Google, Amazon, the NHS and Wellbeing of Women.
Naomi is Director of Neuro-Informed Ltd, helping organisations apply neuroscience to leadership, team development, workplace wellbeing and cognitive health. She is also Director of the UK Brain Health Foundation CIC working at a national and international level on brain health policy. She holds a MSc in Applied Neuroscience from the IoPPN, King’s College, London.
Mel Islin is Membership Manager at Wellbeing of Women and is a specialist in programme and relationship management. She leads the strategic and operational delivery of the Employer Membership Programme at Wellbeing of Women, developing and supporting a dynamic network of organisations committed to improving women’s health in the workplace. With a strong background in project and stakeholder management across sectors, including mental health, disability, women’s health and physical activity, Mel brings a thoughtful, partnership-driven approach that prioritises meaningful impact and long-term collaboration.
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