Less than 2% of clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) have a named specialist clinical lead for men’s health, which could mean gender-specific problems are “overlooked”, a charity said.
The Men’s Health Forum sent a freedom of information request to all CCGs, of which 200 responded and four had a named specialist clinical lead for men’s health.
Less than 2% of clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) have a named specialist clinical lead for men’s health, which could mean gender-specific problems are “overlooked”, a charity said.
The Men’s Health Forum sent a freedom of information request to all CCGs, of which 200 responded and four had a named specialist clinical lead for men’s health.
These were NHS Oxfordshire CCG (Dr Shelly Hayles); NHS North Staffordshire CCG (Dr Paul Unyolo); NHS Brent CCG (Nisheeth Rajpal) and NHS Leicester City CCG (Tony Bentley).
Their statement following the research read: “Without specialist clinical leads, the risk of the gender dimension to health being overlooked or neglected can only be increased.”
“This finding on gender leads coupled with the Men's Health Forum's earlier findings showing how little gender-related health data is collected by local authorities adds up to a picture of local health in which gender is largely absent,” it said.
In comparison, there are three times as many clinical leads for women’s health as there are for men’s, as 14 out of 200 CCGs had a female specialist clinical lead.
The charity added: “Our message to other CCGs: nobody’s saying you’re necessarily neglecting men’s health but without a clinical lead charged with looking out for the gender dimension, how can you be sure?”
