Transvaginal mesh in Australia: An analysis of news media reporting from 1996 to 2021 (22 February 2023)

Summary

In Australia, as in many other countries, the harms caused by transvaginal mesh surgery have prompted individual and collective attempts to achieve redress. Media outlets covered aspects of the rise of mesh surgery as a procedure, the experience of mesh-affected women and the formal inquiries and legal actions that followed,

The authors of this article in the journal Health Expectations conducted a media analysis of the ten most read Australian newspapers and online news media platforms, focusing on how mesh and the interaction of stakeholders in mesh stories were presented to the Australian public. They found that mass media reporting, combined with medicolegal action and an Australian Senate Inquiry, appears to have provided women with greater epistemic justice, with powerful actors considering their stories. They argue that although medical reporting is not recognised in the hierarchy of evidence embedded in the medical knowledge system, in this case, media reporting has contributed to shaping medical knowledge in significant ways.