Gender Medicine focuses on the impact of the gender on human physiology, pathophysiology, and clinical features of diseases.

The concept of Gender refers to a complex interrelation and integration of sex – as a biological and functional marker of the human body – and psychological and cultural behaviour (due to ethnical, social, and religious background).

The attention to the impact of the gender differences on the pathophysiology and, therefore, on the management of the most common social diseases – such as cardiovascular diseases, osteoporosis, diabetes, neurodegenerative disorders, anxiety and mood disorders, joints and rheumatic diseases, some tumors, to list a few – is both needed and lacking. In response to this challenge the Giovanni Lorenzini Medical Foundation is assisting in the establishment of the European Society of Gender Health and Medicine.

This website is intended as a tool for the general practitioner and specialist interested in gender health and medicine. The site is also directed to those professionals working in the fields of communication, media, health policy, and health economics, and it is based on the premise that individuals have both an interest in and a responsibility for their own health care.

Among its aims, the website wants to open a debate to create a stimulating discussion and exchange of opinions on the many emerging hot topics in gender medicine.

The goal of the site, as well as of the European and Italian Societies of Gender Health and Medicine, is not linked to the creation of a new specialty in gender medicine, but rather represents efforts to focus attention on gender differences and their impact on the individual in the diagnosis, prevention and treatment of disease, within the many medical specialties.

Among the website sections, Topics will be updated frequently with literature references identified by the Editorial Committee and the Working Groups or suggested by the readers, to offer a wide selection of articles dealing with gender differences relative to specific approaches on the different pathologies.

The same concept has been applied to the list of Scientific Societies which may be added to, based on suggestions from our readers.

The section Public offers an overview of national and international activities in the field of health and gender medicine.

The purpose of the section Questionnaire is to gather comprehensive information on experts in the field and other individuals (both professional and lay) who are interested or actively working in the area of gender health and medicine to create and define a map of professionals and Centres of Excellence operating in Europe. Another aim of this website is, in fact, to create a link and provide an exchange among groups working in this new and emerging area.

The section Database offers an analytical listing of publications (articles and editorials) on the topic of gender health and medicine selected by the Editorial Committee and the Working Groups or suggested by the readers.

Through the section Gender Medicine in Europe we want to create an open space where national and international gender societies, research centres, and clinical departments working in this field will have the opportunity to post their links or other information to be circulated through this website.

The European Society of Gender Health and Medicine is willing to collaborate with all scientific societies interested in dedicating a portion of their efforts to the gender differences approach. As such, the website is an open arena where the Working Groups of the European and Italian Societies of Gender Health and Medicine present their data and activities on gender differences, focussing on basic research and clinical issues, in the different areas of interest. The Working Groups are not in competition with scientific societies in the same specialty, but rather they are complementary and open to any forms of co-operation which will develop and increase the knowledge and methodological approaches dedicated to the realization of a medicine which takes into consideration gender differences.