Menopausal women have to be “bullies” to be listened to by doctors and receive treatment, Mariella Frostrup has said.
The campaigner and broadcaster said women struggle to be heard when trying to get help for their symptoms.
Speaking to MPs on the Women and Equalities Committee she said: “The point at the moment is, you have to be a bully to be heard when it comes to menopause.
“You have to walk into your GP with a piece of paper with the [National Institute for Health and Care Excellence] guidelines on it, and you have to carry Davina [McCall's] book, or my book, or someone else’s book and you have to go there and say, 'I want this because of this, this this and this'.
“And most women don’t feel the confidence to go and do that.”
MPs heard evidence from campaigners during a follow-up evidence session on menopause and the workplace.
Last year, the committee submitted 12 recommendations for reform to support women going through menopause in the workplace, including a pilot for menopause leave.
But the Government rejected the proposal, as well as a suggestion to make menopause a protected characteristic.
The attendees also reacted angrily to the news that Maria Caulfield, minister for women and minister for mental health and women’s health strategy, had reportedly refused to attend the session.
Carol Vorderman, broadcaster and patron of the Menopause Mandate, said Ms Caulfield “couldn’t be bothered to turn up”.
A letter sent to Ms Caulfield from Caroline Noakes, chair of the committee, dated Mar 10 questioned whether the minister was taking her role, or the issue of the menopause “seriously” after refusing to attend Wednesday's session.
“It is a discourtesy that you are abdicating your responsibility, to women and to this committee, to answer questions about vital policy issues, such as current HRT supplies and pre-payment certificates, which the Government has only just now managed to implement,” the letter said.
‘Patronising statements’
Ms Vorderman added she was “horrified” to hear Kemi Badenoch, the minister for women and equalities, speaking to the committee previously about the issue.
“I could not as a woman, a postmenopausal woman, who was from a working class background, get over the patronising statements that she made,” she said.
“I thought they were insulting, they were insulting to all women.
“She basically said… this was a ‘left-wing issue’ when we were talking about menopause and a pilot in the workplace, and characteristically compared women going through terrible, terrible menopausal symptoms with those… with ginger hair, to short people.”
Ms Badenoch said at the hearing earlier this month: "I am speaking from a center-right perspective.
"I do not think that creating another pilot on more leave is what is going to help women who have the menopause."
