Doctors aren't taught enough about menopause… wait, what?!

If you've been trying to understand your own menopause on Instagram, like most of us, you've probably heard more than once that in some countries doctors are barely taught anything about menopause. In the United Kingdom, 4 out of 10 medical schools have no mandatory menopause teaching at all. In the United States, only 7 out of 100 doctors in specialty training feel ready to care for a woman in menopause, and 2 out of 10 didn't receive a single class on menopause during their entire specialty training.

So what happens in Mexico? I reviewed the official programs of the 10 public universities that graduate the most doctors. I read the programs of every course they publish, across the 6 to 7 years of medical school, not just the Gynecology course. (Of the 10 universities I looked at, one doesn't make its curriculum public, so the findings below come from 9 universities.)

What I found

In half of the universities I reviewed, menopause takes up 7 hours or less in the entire degree. Even UNAM (Mexico's National Autonomous University), the university that trains the most doctors and one of those that devotes the most hours to it, barely reaches about 10 hours across all the courses of the degree.

Within the 350 hours of UNAM's Gynecology course, 159 hours go to pregnancy and childbirth, and 30 to sexually transmitted infections. Menopause doesn't even get its own hours. In 14 hours they cover, all together: menstrual disorders, menstrual pain, absent periods, the changes when the ovaries slow down, and hormone therapy.

Menopause doesn't even get its own hours

UNAM's Gynecology and Obstetrics course: 350 hours in total.

Pregnancy and childbirth159 h

Sexually transmitted infections30 h

Menstrual disorders, menstrual pain, absent periods, the changes when the ovaries slow down and hormone therapy, all together14 h

Source: Gynecology and Obstetrics academic program, Facultad de Medicina, UNAM, 2026.

Also, in several universities, a good part of those few hours of “menopause classes” are actually hours of hospital practice. There, you don't choose the topic you want to learn: you see whoever comes in with whatever symptom they have. Nothing guarantees that you study menopause in depth.

Perimenopause doesn't only happen in the ovaries and the uterus. It also affects the bladder, the joints, the skin, the heart, sleep and mood. Even so, in courses such as Urology, Rheumatology, Cardiology, Dermatology or Psychiatry, menopause almost never appears. It isn't in the Oncology programs I was able to review either, even though chemotherapy can bring on menopause abruptly and breast cancer is one of the main concerns when prescribing hormone therapy.

In most universities, the Urology class covers erectile dysfunction and not menopause, even though recurrent urinary tract infections are a very important symptom in both perimenopause and postmenopause.

But I see private doctors

If that's your case, you may think this doesn't affect you because you go to a private doctor. I have bad news for you too:

• Of the general practitioners who graduate every year in Mexico, 2 out of 3 come from public universities, and you've already read above what their curricula include.
• Of the country's most important private universities, I was only able to review two that do publish their curricula. In both, menopause appears only once, within the syllabus of another course. In one of them, I estimated it amounts to one hour of class.
• Almost 9 out of 10 doctors who complete a specialty, such as Gynecology or Endocrinology, do so at a public university.

Even if you see a private doctor, they most likely studied at a public university

● public university   ● private university

2 out of 3
general practitioners

9 out of 10
specialists (gynecology, endocrinology…)

Source: ANUIES, higher education statistical yearbooks, 2023–2026.

My lifelong gynecologist is really good

Then you reach this stage, whether because of your age, a surgery or cancer treatment, and you think your usual gynecologist, who knows you and whom you trust, will be there for you. The reality is that often that won't be the case, because she doesn't even know that her training in menopause was insufficient.

At UNAM, the Gynecology specialty lasts 4 years. I reviewed its official class syllabus: the Endocrinology unit covers puberty, polycystic ovaries and absent periods, but not menopause. The word “menopause” only appears in the list of recommended books and standards. What they learn in practice depends on the hospital they're assigned to. We'll talk about this in depth in an upcoming piece, because the absence of menopause in medical specialties is still downright awful.

Menopause, the great ignored

Is there any course dedicated to menopause? No, not at any university. Not at these two private ones nor at the 9 public ones I reviewed. In all of them, menopause is, at most, a topic within another course, almost always Gynecology.

So, when you ask yourself, why don't I know anything about menopause?, before being so hard on yourself and feeling like the dumbest woman in the world, well, what else could we expect, if not even doctors know enough about it?

In medical school, other stages of life do have their own full course: childhood has Pediatrics; pregnancy, Obstetrics (in several universities), and old age, Geriatrics (in almost all of them). Menopause doesn't, even though it comes to all "living women" and, once it arrives, we live in postmenopause for the rest of our lives; that is, more than a third of it.

Other stages of life do have their own course

Childhood hasPediatrics ✓

Pregnancy hasObstetrics ✓

Old age hasGeriatrics ✓

Menopause hasnothing ✕

Obstetrics in several universities; Geriatrics in almost all. Menopause: in none of the 11 reviewed.

Medical school has a great deal to teach, and maybe there's no room for a course only on menopause, something I understand but question. What it could at least have is its own unit, with enough hours, within Gynecology, and also be present in the courses we end up in, such as Urology, Cardiology, Psychiatry or Oncology.

So, what do we do?

When you reach this stage, the general practitioner or the gynecologist who should guide you with your first symptoms often doesn't, nor refers you to the right specialist: the one who trained in menopause and keeps up to date, whether a general practitioner, gynecologist, endocrinologist or another specialty. And it's not that he doesn't want to help you: it's that he wasn't taught what he needed.

Finding a health professional who is truly up to date and knows how to treat menopause is still, sadly, like looking for a needle in a haystack. If you've already found that person, value her and recommend her, because what she knows how to do has been 100% her own merit. The system isn't designed to fully care for us at this stage and, if you push me, at many others either.

This is what I've learned a professional who knows how to treat menopause does:

• She has current certification and training in menopause.
• She follows the most up-to-date medical guidelines and looks for other evidence-based options. She keeps up with the latest research.
• She listens to you.
• She goes by your symptoms, not just your lab results.
• She accompanies you throughout the whole stage, not just in one appointment.
• She also offers you non-hormonal options.
• She reviews your specific case: your history and your contraindications. She explains it to you and decides together with you what's best for you.
• She doesn't profit from selling hormones, pellets (hormone implants under the skin) or supplements.

And in the meantime, while we look for these specialists, what we can do is research and learn, ask for the care we need, and not let anyone tell us we're exaggerating. It's up to us to arrive at our appointments very well prepared, with our cycle and symptoms carefully written down, backed by the NOM (Mexico's official health standard for menopause) and the medical guidelines that say how we should be treated. It's not that this is our responsibility, it shouldn't be, but for now we have no choice but to do it to find help as soon as possible. In doing so, we'll also be paving the way for the women who come after us.

At No exageras we're working to publish information that will help you advocate for yourself, and concrete tools to help you navigate a medical system that has excluded us for decades.

How I measured it: I counted what the current official programs of each degree say, reviewed in October 2026. Almost no program gives hours per topic: I estimated them by dividing each unit's hours among its topics. The hours don't include the internship year. Some programs are old or about to change. What happens in each classroom may vary. Universities reviewed: UNAM, Universidad de Guadalajara, IPN, Universidad Autónoma de Sinaloa, UANL, BUAP, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Universidad Veracruzana, Universidad Michoacana and Universidad Autónoma de Chihuahua. BUAP doesn't publish its programs.