“We have to change the narrative of endometriosis by focusing on when the patients actually start having symptoms, often even before they have had their first period.”
As the founder of the Child Endometriosis Foundation/ Barnendometriosfonden, Katarina Steinfeldt Olbers is a passionate advocate for the right to health, health care, and diagnosis for children and adolescents suffering from hashtagendometriózis.
Her focus as an educator and keynote speaker is to shed light on the fact that 38% of endometriosis sufferers had symptoms before the age of 15 and 70% before the age of 20.
This makes endometriosis a disease that above all affects children and adolescents. Who, due to the misconception that endometriosis is a disease only in women deprives them of their fundamental rights to health, health care, and diagnosis.
Most important to her work is the children’s perspective and children’s right to health, active leisure time, and the right to care for their chronic illness.
The average age to get diagnosed in Sweden is when the patient is 37 years of age.