Co-creating menstrual health interventions with university students in Ecuador: findings from a participatory pilot study

This pilot study examined the use of a participatory approach to co-create and prioritise menstrual health actions and interventions with university students in Ecuador. Despite growing recognition of the importance of menstrual health, university students continue to face unmet needs that can affect academic participation and daily life. Between October and November 2023, three in-person workshops engaged a total of 37 students in a structured co-creation process. The first workshop involved collaborative brainstorming, generating 31 proposed actions and interventions organised into four participant-derived categories: resources, support, infrastructure, and education. The second workshop involved thr independent ranking of the actions and interventions using a structured worksheet, with descriptive statistics used to identify a subset of highly prioritised options. The third workshop focused on refining these priorities through guided group discussion. The highest-ranked actions and interventions identified from the participatory process included institutional flexibility for chronic menstrual conditions, education-based initiatives, improved toilet/bathroom access, and student-led support. Rather than providing generalisable evidence of intervention effectiveness or population-level need, this study highlights how participatory, process-oriented methods can help generate a context-specific, student-informed response. Findings highlight the value of participatory approaches in surfacing nuanced, actionable insights in menstrual health research.