The number and proportion of elderly people are growing at an unprecedented rate. By 2030, the population aged 60 and over is expected to constitute one-sixth of the global population, and the number will increase to about 2.1 billion worldwide by 2050. The ageing population is exacerbating the shortage of health and social security resources, posing a severe challenge to the existing healthcare system. Consequently, using innovative, integrated and digitally supported solutions is an urgent challenge to address the complex medical and organisational issues caused by the health and care needs of elderly people.

Globally, women continue to suffer the negative effects on their health of the persistent delay in the use of gender medicine, i.e. the biomedical concept that clinical strategies and therapeutic solutions can be optimised for women’s health when the biological differences between women and men are taken into account. In addition, the possibilities for prevention and treatment of typical female health conditions need to be enhanced: complications of pregnancy and childbirth, cervical and breast cancer, hormonal disorders, osteoporosis. Technological innovations have improved women’s health in recent decades, but the benefits remain unevenly distributed. The development of technologies dedicated to women, or “femtech”, is growing rapidly, but technology alone cannot solve the root causes of unmet health needs. Transformative progress for women’s health worldwide also requires appropriate integrated and multidisciplinary solutions that address systemic inequalities.