Women are not being represented well in sports and exercise studies due to their menstruation, according to an editorial in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. The underrepresentation is happening even if the gap in exercise participation between men and women is decreasing.
"The complexities of the menstrual cycle are considered major barriers to the inclusion of women in clinical trials," the editorial said. Medical and drug trials have traditionally been restricted to men because there was concern that unborn fetuses might be harmed by the trials, the authors said.
Women's period seen as barrier to medical research https://t.co/kWwe2JPDeD pic.twitter.com/M8qbe1oK56
— CBC News (@CBCNews) June 7, 2016
Limited Sports And Exercise Research On Women
Frequently, research on women who exercise is limited, Live Science reported. Women who are part of research are often tested when their hormone levels are low, according to lead author Georgie Bruinvels. Studies may also be limited to women taking birth control pills while some researchers may not take into account the effects of menstruation at all.
"Women athletes have to compete at all phases of their menstrual cycles, yet currently only a snapshot of time is being researched," said Bruinvels. Bruinvels is a doctoral student in the division of surgery and interventional science at University College London.
Menstruation Needs To Be Understood
EurekAlert reported that research has revealed that many women athletes think that menstruation influences their training and causes bad performance. The editorial said that there needs to be more understanding of menstruation "to address the reported negative impacts on exercise training in order to encourage participation and avoid further disparity in gender representation."
According to CBC, Bruinvels is conducting a research on menstruation and sports performance. Bruinvels is looking into how iron deficiency in women during their menstruation is affecting their performance. Bruinvels is said to be seeking to address the disparity of representation of men and women in all kinds of medical research and not just on those geared towards sports and exercise.
