The Center for Gynepathology Research (CGR) welcomed over 250 attendees to campus on September 30 for Menstruation Science Day at MIT. It was a vibrant gathering uniting students, faculty, industry partners, clinicians, and advocates around the urgent need to advance women’s health innovation. Centered on a screening of the documentary End of the Cycle and a multidisciplinary panel discussion, the event marked an important milestone in connecting patient lived experience directly with biomedical discovery.
Following the program, MIT’s student newspaper, The Tech, published an insightful feature story by Lauren Adler covering the event: “Lived experience meets MIT research.”
Adler’s article explores how CGR is working to flip the script on historically underfunded gynecological conditions by pairing scientific innovation with patient advocacy. The piece highlights central themes from the evening’s discussion:
- Centering patient voices: Documentary co-director Sammy Jaye Lang on prolonged diagnostic delays and systemic barriers facing individuals with endometriosis.
- Clinical care and therapeutics: Dr. Stephanie N. Morris on the impact of earlier clinical diagnosis, and Dr. Stephen Palmer on reframing endometriosis as a systemic immune challenge rather than a purely hormonal disorder.
- Interdisciplinary research: Prof. Linda Griffith and biology collaborator Prof. Eliezer Calo on how cross-departmental collaboration at MIT is helping unravel the complex cellular biology of endometrial diseases.
For an inside look at the hands-on demos and community turnout, read our Menstruation Science Day Event Recap, and explore the coverage on The Tech website.
