CONFERENCE PURPOSE AND GOALS

The BRIDGE conference: We gather in Boston, July 16-17, 2018, as scientists, patient advocates, and policy makers committed to transforming health and health care for women.

• When a woman has gestational diabetes, prenatal care is intensively focused on having a healthy baby, and after that, women fall into the chasm between ob-gyn and primary care. The needs of the new baby come before their own future health. Who is paying attention to what Clancy called the patchwork quilt of women’s health services? “Bridging the Chasm” is about changing this dynamic.
• We will work across the life span, across social and racial differences, across geographies, and across sectors and domains of expertise.
• We come together, funded by the Patient-Centered Care Outcomes Research Initiative (PCORI), the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), and the Office of Research on Women’s Health, to make “Bridging the Chasm” a different kind of conference that strengthens the path to health across the life cycle. Built into the design of this pioneering 2-day conference is a commitment to create a platform for real change.

The Bridge the Gap Conference has two aims:

1) to create a national strategy for research and action for preventive care for women over the life course, especially after pregnancy complications warn of future risk for type 2 diabetes and other chronic illnesses, and

2) to establish a growing network of empowered patient advocates, clinicians, researchers, systems innovators, and policy-makers, who will continue to develop promising new initiatives.