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The Significance of Gender Medicine

Dr. Marianne Legato explains that Gender Medicine is not Women's Health, which it is often misconceived as. It's the study of the differences of how men and women function normally in all the systems of the body. It also looks at how people experience diseases differently as a function of being men or women. It's a very evenly split discipline that emphasizes men as much as it emphasizes women. When the focus is placed on men, they have just as much unique physiology and experience of illness as women. As we begin to study women more and reap this tremendous harvest of differences, even in the differences in the ways genes are expressed as a function of sex, it's important to look back at men with the question, "What is unique about men?"

Dr. Legato observes the most important difference she's noticed from studying men is their vulnerability, from the moment they're conceived until the time they die. At all ages, men are more likely to die than women. Dr. Legato believes it's time to consider whether or not this isn't the first, and most serious, health issue of our time. "The vulnerability of men."

Dr. Marianne J. Legato, MD, FACP, a specialist in Gender Specific Medicine, or Women's Medicine and Men's Medicine respectively. Dr. Legato is part of the Women's Heart Foundation, an international gathering of nurse executives, civic leaders, community health directors, member hospitals, partners, providers and corporate sponsors who want something done to fight women's heart disease. Dr. Legato promotes the inclusion of women in clinical trials of relevance to the health of both men and women. She furthers the study of biological differences in men and women, and how gender plays a role in the diagnosis and treatment of disease, all to benefit patients.

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