Who we are
About the Victorian Women’s Health Services Network
Women’s health services are centres of excellence in gendered health promotion and prevention, winning awards for innovations and achievements.
There are 12 women’s health services across Victoria; three are statewide and nine are region-based. We have been a central part of Victoria’s public health infrastructure for four decades, coordinating local place-based health promotion activities, which is enhanced by our collaborative statewide approach.
We are the only state or territory with this unique infrastructure and reach, supporting the health system to create the best possible health outcomes for women. We use evidence-based research to ensure that women stay well, and if they do need access to healthcare services, that they receive the care that supports their return to health.
Who we are
Advancing Victorian women’s health and equality across four decades
The women’s health sector has been a driving force progressing and shaping Victoria’s women’s health and equality space since its establishment in the late 1980s. As dedicated preventative health services, the sector was a leading voice in advocating for the expansion of Victoria’s policy and programmatic focus from purely response to one that recognises primary prevention as crucial to addressing the drivers of women’s inequitable health and wellbeing outcomes.
Through its unique role as a network of independent place-based organisations, the sector is able to collaborate to lead and coordinate best practice health promotion across the state. This includes a dual role of translating evidence, research and policy into on-the-ground practice, while also informing the state’s programmatic and policy design based on community need, promising practice and the emerging evidence base. Efficiency and effectiveness are maximised by a commitment to evidence-based approaches, including a long-term commitment to sharing research and practice knowledge across the network of services. By centring the voices of women, the sector is able to identify and respond to their current and emerging priority issues, and
use this knowledge to help shape the government’s health agenda.
The sector has a strong track record and reputation for leadership and impact in Victoria. This includes a substantial contribution to building the evidence base in Australia through centring the lived experiences of women in research and identifying real-world gaps and potential solutions to advancing women’s health and equality. This innovation and expertise has been recognised through a large range of local, Victorian and national awards over the years, as well as within key state government documents such as the Royal Commission into family violence findings; Free from violence: Victoria’s strategy to prevent family violence and all forms of violence against women; Safe and strong: A Victorian gender equality strategy; and Victorian women’s sexual and reproductive health plan 2022–30.
Some of the sector’s most significant impacts over the last four decades include:
Evidence-building and advocacy to ensure women’s voices and needs are consistently represented on the state’s agenda, including bringing vital gendered analysis to legislation, policy and programs. As a result, today Victoria leads some of the most innovative and progressive reforms to advance women’s health and equality in Australia.
Driving state reform to advance women’s health and equality such as ongoing advocacy on abortion reform. This long-term evidence-building, education, advocacy and coalition-building has contributed to life-saving advances towards a safe, accessible and empowering Victorian sexual and reproductive health system.
Leading the way in building evidence and practice knowledge about what works in primary prevention. This innovation has driven many of the first primary prevention pilot projects in Australia, significantly shaping what is now recognised as best practice and embedded as core work within state government strategies and plans.
Building Victoria’s capacity to undertake inclusive and intersectional practice in the women’s health and equality space. This has contributed to the growing practice and evidence base for what more inclusive, intersectional primary prevention work might look like, and developed more nuanced understandings of the intersections of gender with other forms of privilege and oppression.
Ensuring gender remains in focus, particularly during times of crisis such as the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent economic downturn. The sector has provided ongoing real-time intersectional analysis that seeks to mitigate the potential for the pandemic response and recovery to exacerbate and worsen women’s health and equality outcomes. This influence is reflected across significant recent and current policy and programmatic decisions.