At Santis Health, we help organizations and companies navigate policy shifts and anticipate changing government funding priorities across Canada’s health ecosystem.
Women’s health, in particular, is undergoing transformative changes and attracting unprecedented attention. Canada is moving towards introducing a national framework for women’s health, intended to fix inequities in systemic access to care and knowledge to improve health outcomes.
There are plenty of stats that illustrate why Canada has been in dire need of a women’s national health strategy. Canadian women spend 24% more time in poor health than men and are more likely to experience conditions that are under-diagnosed, under-researched, or misattributed, according to the McKinsey Health Institute’s 2025 “Closing the women’s health gap” report. Further to this, McKinsey estimates that the cost of inaction is $37 billion in lost GDP each year by 2040, with seven fewer healthy days of life per year for every Canadian woman.
We’re at a critical juncture in which innovators and change-makers can lead the way in improving access to care, knowledge, and resources in women’s health. And we’re actively witnessing important changes to the way we view common women’s health conditions which will have far-ranging implications.
For instance, PCOS was formally renamed polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome (PMOS), a positive shift toward recognizing the broad, system-wide effects of the condition rather than focusing on the ovaries and fertility alone.
Mirianna Georges, Government Relations Analyst at Santis, shares her thoughts on what this name change signals as a person with lived experience of PMOS:
Since I was 14, I understood polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) the way the name lays it out: something related to the ovaries and to fertility, to be worried about down the line. For many people with this condition, though, there is often a turning point in their medical journey that reveals its larger implications. A referral to a dietitian, for instance, might open a discussion about nutrition and food intake and how they affect PCOS symptoms.
The myopic view that PCOS was solely about cysts, as the name suggests, detracted from the clear fact that more complex pathways were at work that should be addressed, managed, and treated in a targeted way. For example, many people with PCOS carry an increased risk of diabetes and heart disease that is seldom named as a central feature of the condition.
The World Health Organization estimates that 70 per cent of those affected have never been diagnosed at all, which is considerable given that PMOS affects roughly one in eight women worldwide and about one in 10 women in Canada. When a condition has been characterized by a narrow set of criteria for a long time, it becomes easy to miss the experiences of those who do not meet that criteria, which often delays necessary treatment or access to the appropriate resources.
This gap is not unique to PMOS. It shows up across women’s health, where female-specific conditions have long been under-recognized, misdiagnosed, and under-resourced.
Polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome puts that emphasis where it belongs. “Polyendocrine” recognizes that several hormone systems are involved, including insulin, androgens, and the hormones that regulate the reproductive cycle, rather than the ovaries alone. “Metabolic” names the part of the condition that carries some of its most serious long-term risks: insulin resistance, a heightened chance of Type 2 diabetes that tends to appear earlier than it otherwise would, and greater risk for cardiovascular disease. These risks should not be sidelined – for many people living with PMOS these are core to their experience and should influence the way they receive treatment and access resources.
For those of us who live with PMOS , the new name is not a surface level correction. It signals that an all-systems approach to women’s health may finally be taking hold, one that recognizes the hormonal and metabolic implications of the condition the same way it recognizes the reproductive and fertility ones.
The PCOS to PMOS name change marks an important step in recognizing the nuances of conditions that affect women. But for true system change to take effect, life sciences companies, health associations, government, and non-profits must take a proactive role in shaping this new era of women’s health.
This is where strategic advocacy and system navigation are crucial. Whether it’s advocating for updated provincial drug formularies to cover metabolic treatments, calling for equitable research funding and clinical trials conducted in Canada, or developing strategic communications to educate providers, organizations need to engage the right decision-makers at the right time to be at the forefront of the conversation.
How Santis Health Can Help
Santis Health sits at the intersection of advocacy, system navigation, and strategic counselling. We partner with organizations to help transform health outcomes and improve care for Canadians.
Advancing women’s health initiatives is a core pillar of our work and our team specializes in helping organizations not only respond to shifts in the health ecosystem but emerge as leaders, collaborating to:
- Drive policy change: Craft compelling advocacy and GA strategies to help secure government funding and align with shifting public health priorities.
- Enhance market access: Support pharmaceutical and life sciences leaders in communicating the multi-system value of their treatments to key stakeholders.
- Build thought leadership: Design strategic campaigns that position our clients as leading voices in the next phase of women’s health.
Learn more about our work here.