ORWH 30th Anniversary Virtual Meeting Series

In recognition of the NIH Office of Research on Women’s Health’s (ORWH) 30^th anniversary, we invite you to attend the ORWH 30^th Anniversary Virtual Meeting Series: Advancing the Health of Women Through Science on December 14–16, 2020. Each meeting will offer enlightening presentations on health research, scientific advances in the influence of sex and gender on health and disease, and work to support the advancement of women in biomedical careers. Additional topics will include sex as a biological variable, cardiovascular health, low-risk labor and birth, mental health, and more. Details on each of the meetings and speakers are provided below. 

BIRCWH Annual Meeting, December 14, 2020, 10 a.m.–6 p.m. ET

• The Ruth L. Kirschstein Memorial Lectureship, provided by Patricia E. Molina, M.D., Ph.D., the Richard Ashman Professor of Physiology at the Louisiana State University School of Medicine in New Orleans, will focus on the importance of, and improvements made in, mentoring young investigators.

• Claire Sterk, Ph.D., President Emerita and Charles Howard Candler Professor of Public Health at Emory University, will be giving a Legacy of Leadership lecture in honor of BIRCWH’s 20^th anniversary, and the plenary session will feature presentations on research findings by leading BIRCWH Scholars. Topics include sex differences in cardiovascular health among U.S. adults, oxytocin administration in low-risk labor and birth, and neurobiological links to the experience of pain from stimuli that are not normally painful and anxiety-related behaviors.

ORWH 30^th Anniversary Scientific Symposium, “Advancing the Health of Women Through Science,” December 15, 2020, 9:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m. ET

• NIH Director Francis Collins, M.D., Ph.D., will give the opening remarks, which will be followed by a morning keynote address on women’s mental health across the life course by Pauline M. Maki, Ph.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Obstetrics & Gynecology and Director of the Women’s Mental Health Research Program at the University of Illinois at Chicago. The afternoon keynote speaker will be Mary Woolley, M.A., President of Research! America, who will explore the role of advocacy in empowering women’s health research and medical research in general.

• A panel of leaders from across NIH will discuss their perspectives on women’s health:
• • Diana Bianchi, M.D., Director, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development 
  • Gwen Collman, Ph.D., Acting Deputy Director, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences
  • Helene Langevin, M.D., Director, National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health
  • Monica Webb Hooper, Ph.D., Deputy Director, National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities
  • Norman Sharpless, M.D., Director, National Cancer Institute
  • Nora Volkow, M.D., Director, National Institute on Drug Abuse
• In addition, there will be presentations on high-priority women’s health topics, such as applying the principle of studying sex as a biological variable across scientific disciplines.

SCORE Annual Meeting Keynote Address, December 16, 2020, 10:40 a.m.–11:30 a.m. ET

• Jocalyn Clark, Ph.D., Executive Editor of The Lancet, will present the keynote address, titled “Sex Differences Research and the Health of Women: An Editor’s Perspective.”

For more information and to register for these events, please visit our 30^th anniversary webpage. In order to attend you must register for the events.