Women with the Issue of Blood is a call to action rooted in faith, public health, and the urgent need to center Black women and girls in women’s health research.

The title of the film was inspired by the biblical account of the woman with the issue of blood, whose story appears in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Although each Gospel offers a different perspective, the woman is never given a name. She is primarily remembered for her bleeding and for the moment Jesus healed her. Yet her story is about more than a miracle. For twelve years, she lived with a chronic condition that affected her body, finances, relationships, and place within her community. While others may have defined her by her illness, Jesus recognized her as a whole person and called her “Daughter.”

That moment of recognition sits at the heart of this film.

Through medical anthropology and historical analysis, Women with the Issue of Blood explores how gynecological conditions have existed across generations, while women’s pain and reproductive health concerns have often been misunderstood, dismissed, or inadequately studied. These failures remain persistent within the United States and disproportionately affect African American and Black women and girls.

The film brings together personal testimonies and subject-matter expert commentary to examine the connections among epigenetics, preconception health, the troubling history of gynecology and women’s health research, systemic racism, medical gaslighting, and present-day disparities in care. By placing lived experience alongside scientific and historical evidence, the film challenges audiences to see these women not simply as patients, diagnoses, or statistics, but as individuals whose voices, bodies, and futures matter.