Bridging the Gender Pain Gap: From Understanding to Action | WHISE

Women’s pain is too often dismissed, minimised or left undiagnosed. That pattern is not inevitable. It is produced by how systems of care are designed, funded and connected, which means organisations in our region can change it.

In August 2026, more than 70 practitioners from health, community, social services, family violence and multicultural sectors came together for the first Bridging the Gender Pain Gap workshop, hosted by Women’s Health in the South East (WHISE). Guided by women with lived experience and the Victorian Government’s Bridging the Gender Pain Gap report, participants mapped where systems are falling short and what could change. They also asked for a next step: a chance to move from shared understanding to shared action.

This workshop is that next step.

Over two hours online, you will work in a small, facilitated breakout room on one of nine priority themes identified in Workshop 1. Together, your room will shape one clear, realistic action that organisations in the region can start within the next three months, using resources they already have, led by a named person from a partner organisation.

Ideas that need new funding, policy change or a longer timeframe will not be lost. They will feed a shared regional advocacy agenda and the work of a possible regional Community of Practice on women’s pain.

You do not need to have attended Workshop One. The session opens with a short synthesis of what we heard, so everyone starts from the same place.

Register here