BMC Women’s Health is proud to participate in today’s celebration of International Women’s Day. Women’s Day is a chance to celebrate the achievements of women worldwide and draw attention to the challenges that women many still face in contemporary society. We are privileged to publish and communicate high quality research regarding the physical, mental, and emotional health of women in developed and developing nations.

Read on for some highlights from our recent publications:

• In their article entitled “Unmarried women’s ways for facing single motherhood in Sri Lanka – A qualitative interview study”, Malin Jordal and colleagues studied the challenges, attitudes, and behaviour of single mothers in Sri Lanka. They found that these women expressed self-blame, victimhood, and suicidal thoughts, and strove for acceptance and financial survival. The authors concluded that a social environment highly condemning of unmarried motherhood restricted the ability of single mothers in Sri Lanka to make healthy choices for themselves and their children.

• Hiroko Sakai and Kazutomo Ohashi, in their article “Association of menstrual phase with smoking behavior, mood and menstrual phase-associated symptoms among young Japanese woman smokers”, explore the correlation between amount of smoking, cigarette cravings and depression with menstrual phase in young women. The authors found that young Japanese women smokers smoke more during the menstrual and luteal phases, although the cause-effect relationship has not been determined.

• In a study of “The health of women in the US fire service”, Sarah Jahnke and colleagues assessed multiple health outcomes and health risk behaviors that are important to the fire service. They found that female firefighters had more favorable body composition than male firefighters when comparing health measures such as BMI and waist circumference; however, tobacco use rates were generally higher among females than males. Their results suggest that this occupational sub-population faces unique health risk behavior challenges.

• Julio Frank and colleagues discuss how women’s health issues were addressed in the recent Mexican health care system reform in their Debate entitled: “A comprehensive approach to women’s health: lessons from the Mexican health reform”. The authors argue that health system reform offers the opportunity to address women’s health needs by recognizing women as formal and informal providers of health care.

For more information about BMC Women’s Health, visit our website. Or, read more about our editorial board and research interests on the BMC-series blog.