Women’s Health Research at Yale celebrates 15 years of success

Women’s Health Research at Yale (WHRY), whose mission is to ensure that women are included in research studies, gender differences in health are examined, and health outcomes are analyzed by gender, celebrated its 15th anniversary in February.

Since its inception, WHRY has awarded more than $4.4 million in “seed” grants to more than 60 Yale investigators. Many of these scientists used the results from WHRY-funded studies to obtain a total of nearly $50 million in grants that further their work in key areas of research. Some of these areas include developing new models for treating breast cancer and preventing tumor metastasis; smoking and other addictive behaviors; cardiovascular disease; depression; osteoporosis; and adaptation of returning women combat veterans.

WHRY’s mission also includes building interdisciplinary research cores, training the next generation of researchers, and engaging the community through outreach.

“Three-fourths of the pilot investigators are junior and mid-level faculty who need initial funding to launch their research on women’s health and gender differences,” says Carolyn M. Mazure, Ph.D., director of WHRY, professor of psychiatry and psychology, and associate dean for faculty affairs. “More than half of the funded investigators obtained external funding using their pilot results, at least five times the success rate for new investigator-initiated National Institutes of Health grant applications.”

WHRY was founded in 1998 with funding from the Patrick and Catherine Weldon Donaghue Medical Research Foundation.