{"id":26448,"date":"2024-07-17T15:07:43","date_gmt":"2024-07-17T15:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/?post_type=article&p=26448"},"modified":"2025-12-15T05:10:55","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T05:10:55","slug":"how-sport-wales-is-challenging-the-lack-of-support-and-education-around-female-athlete-health","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-sport-wales-is-challenging-the-lack-of-support-and-education-around-female-athlete-health\/","title":{"rendered":"How Sport Wales Is Challenging the Lack of Support and Education Around Female Athlete Health"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
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\n 17 Jul 2024 <\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>Articles<\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t

How Sport Wales Is Challenging the Lack of Support and Education Around Female Athlete Health<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n \n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Category<\/div>\n Human Performance<\/a>, Leadership & Culture<\/a> <\/div>\n
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https:\/\/leadersinsport.com\/performance-institute\/articles\/how-sport-wales-is-challenging-the-lack-of-support-and-education-around-female-athlete-health\/<\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n\n\n
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As Dr Natalie Brown tells us, Sport Wales\u2019 Female Health and Performance Team is putting the female athlete health at the forefront of performance conversations.<\/p>\n \n \n \n

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By Rachel Woodland, Lottie Wright & Sarah Evans<\/h6>\n
There needs to be more support for practitioners, coaches and others working in sport when it comes to better understanding women\u2019s health.<\/h6>\n

That is the consensus across our Women\u2019s High Performance Sport Community, from ongoing conversations to a recent mini survey conducted during our latest Community call, where the focus turned to education for staff.<\/p>\n

We were joined by Dr Natalie Brown who is a Research Fellow working as part of a collaboration between Sport Wales and Swansea University with the Welsh Institute of Performance Science [WIPS].<\/p>\n

Brown leads the Sport Wales Female Health & Performance Team, which has grown to seven members and is responsible for supporting all staff at Sport Wales in their journeys towards better understanding women\u2019s health.<\/p>\n

Brown\u2019s own reasons for her specialism in women\u2019s health stem from her time as a performance scientist with Welsh and British Swimming. She wanted to know more about what she didn\u2019t know and to support the female athletes as best as possible to optimise their performance. It was an early nod to the relevance and interconnectedness of women\u2019s health for practitioners.<\/p>\n

Support for female athlete health at Sport Wales<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Brown\u2019s time, Sport Wales\u2019 approach to female athlete support has progressed from being wrapped around individuals to three areas of focus:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. System level support<\/li>\n
  2. Individual athlete support (and support for practitioners too)<\/li>\n
  3. Sport-specific support<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    There are also three key themes that span everything Sport Wales do: athlete development, health & wellbeing, and athlete environment. Where once Brown worked alone, she now oversees a multidisciplinary team of seven, with specialisms in physiotherapy, physiology, medical, nutrition, strength & conditioning. The work has gone from focusing on the menstrual cycle to include puberty, relative energy deficiency and more to fully encompass female health support. <\/strong><\/p>\n

    It is critical for those practitioners to be a good fit and Brown’s team was put together by grouping those who had an interest and the drive and motivation to work in this area of sport.<\/strong> Across the Welsh system, it enabled a network of voices to be created, rather than a single voice; making it more embedded and more natural.<\/p>\n

    The team work both in overseeing projects and research into specific areas of women\u2019s health and in supporting the athletes, practitioners, coaches, and sports in applying knowledge to their performances. As Brown said, \u201cwe’ve got a knowledge development, but we’ve also got application and those two things run in parallel.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Their efforts to speak to athletes help them to better understand areas where there was suitable support and where there was not. It enabled the sports science and medicine teams to adapt their athlete support. Concurrently, Brown and her colleagues captured all this information to help inform their progress.<\/p>\n

    Surveys to better understand ways of working<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Seven years ago, Brown\u2019s team circulated a survey for all of Sports Wales\u2019s sports science practitioners. It asked:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. Did practitioners have conversations about the menstrual cycle in their sports, with their athletes, with the coaches?<\/li>\n
    2. How confident are they talking about the topic?<\/li>\n
    3. What is their knowledge level?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      The survey was circulated at a time before women\u2019s health proliferated as a topic of interest. It identified gaps, highlighted the steps needed to effect change, and what practitioners were requesting. And so the team came together that now works within Sport Wales.<\/p>\n

      Having a dedicated Female Health & Performance Team allows planning around how to move forward in support of both female athletes and performance practitioners<\/strong>; and as staff members have changed, so Sport Wales has continued to survey its people. They continually assess people\u2019s comfort levels discussing multiple topics within female health and the factors that influence that comfort.<\/p>\n

      Brown was also particularly interested in whether or not practitioners know where to go to seek further support. The figures are startling. \u201c20 percent still say no, which is too big,\u201d said Brown. That 20 percent is therefore part of her team\u2019s plan. All practitioners need to know that the Female Health & Performance Team is there to support them<\/strong>, and also direct them to other resources and, just as importantly, emphasise that the whole of a team behind a sport need to have this information shared with them.<\/p>\n

      A more recent survey enabled Sport Wales to better understand how it can support its system\u2019s network of coaches and practitioners. Indeed, there is a growing cohort that see the relevance of a female health lens in addressing issues such as injury risk and performance improvements. This information has helped Brown\u2019s team ask for additional resources and support. It also helps build the full story and picture.<\/p>\n

      The emergence of a common practice<\/strong><\/p>\n

      Sport Wales conducted the survey, put together a team, worked across its sports, and what has emerged are common practices that help to embed female health as a topic within the Welsh sport system.<\/p>\n

      For example, as Brown said, \u201cacross the three themes [see above] there are always at least two people from the team asking how does that apply from a female perspective? Have we considered XYZ from a female-specific angle?\u201d<\/p>\n

      The current approach is praised for creating an open culture. The Female Health & Performance Team have worked with the sports to normalise conversations around women\u2019s health and how it relates to performance<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

      Potentially the most interesting piece to emerge from their most recent survey was around knowledge improvement and how the team want to receive information<\/strong>. The two highest reported options were athlete stories & experiences and resources to read. This has led to a shift in how Brown and the team are supporting practitioners and prevented them from heading down the wrong route. It also means that Sport Wales can also think about how to use the stories and experiences to support wider practitioner development. For example, what would it look like for a new starter?<\/p>\n

      It\u2019s standard practice for all Sport Wales projects to be evaluated as they happen, which means that check-ins keep the team challenged and relevant, as well as aligned to organisation\u2019s wider aims. Their purpose and rationale remains clear.<\/p>\n

      Another positive consequence is that Welsh sports proactively approach Brown and her team to request help and support<\/strong>. There\u2019s also now an induction for any athlete joining Great Britain\u2019s World Class Programme. It looks across all areas of female health and includes screening from an MDT approach, which then means specific areas can be addressed for the individual, as well as from the perspective of their sport. The overall goal is to ensure that female health considerations aren\u2019t an extra thing or a tick-box exercise that\u2019s added on but are standard, truly embedded and normal practice for providing individual holistic support<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

      Compared with how things were done previously, one of the biggest changes for Brown has been planning ahead and thinking about how you upskill practitioners and how to engage with sports<\/strong>, as well as identifying which elements are sport-specific and require different support or consideration; and how to provide those resources for athletes, coaches, and practitioners. This is all with the key moment in mind: \u2018the doing of it\u2019.<\/p>\n

      In monthly meetings Brown\u2019s team create scenarios and engage the practitioners in conversations around topics such as energy deficiency or puberty. It provides the space to address meaningful questions as part of the conversation, such as \u2018how does that apply in practice?\u2019 or \u2018what does that mean?\u2019<\/strong> This space has potentially been the most impactful development, according to Brown.<\/p>\n

      Beyond the work that she and her team are completing, they\u2019re linking in with the other parts of the Welsh network across other universities supporting WIPS and Sport Wales, as well as the other Home Nations of the UK. \u201cSo in terms of staying ahead of the curve, it\u2019s always a challenge, especially with the pace at which female sport is currently moving.\u201d<\/p>\n

      How to make female health a performance priority at your team:<\/strong><\/p>\n

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      • Invite people external from your female health and the performance team to come in and join the conversations, raising different questions.<\/li>\n
      • Balance individual needs versus sport specific challenges with whole system support.<\/li>\n
      • Specialist areas need to consider the female specifics as normal, for example nutrition is thought about with that lens too.<\/li>\n
      • If you\u2019re working as a lone ranger in this space, consider how things are being embedded, knowledge is being passed on, and progress to creating a team is happening.<\/li>\n
      • Language is a really important area too. Don\u2019t exclude anyone, but also correct. Underpinning language with evidence has been effective. Language can also be the key to confidence to talk about the topics and roll it out with athletes.<\/li>\n
      • Consider behaviour changes and the role of psychology in female health.<\/li>\n
      • Always provide the evidence of why behind knowledge, advice, support. Especially considering the volume of information, including misinformation, being shared around these topics at the moment.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/p>\n <\/div>\n \n \n \n <\/div>\n
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