Science that Serves Women

Stimulating sex-specific research in healthcare

That men and women are different may seem obvious, but is not considered enough in past and current scientific research. For a long time, men were seen as the standard, meaning that we don’t know enough about what treatments might be best for the female body. This can cause more side effects or less effective treatment.

Raise the level of healthcare for women

Since healthcare for women is still not as evidence-based as healthcare for men, the UMCG aims to raise the level of healthcare for women to the same standard as for men, and to be a leader in knowledge development regarding gender- and life-phase-adjusted medicine.

Seed Grants

To start differentiating more between men and women in research, the Science that Serves Women initiative (in Dutch: 'UMCG maakt het verschil') offers seed grants of 10.000 euro per project each year in the next five years to promising research proposals that aim to reduce the healthcare gap between men and women.

The first round in 2025 saw five projects being awarded with a seed grant. A call for new projects will go out in 2026.

2025 projects

Five seed grants of each 10.000 euro were awarded during the first round to projects aiming to investigate sex differences in healthcare. The first results are expected in 2026.