Making Menopause Support Real: What Employers Are Asking and How We Help

Employers want to support menopause without disrupting their plans. Learn what they are asking for and how pharmacy benefits can help.

  • 4 Min read

  • January 26, 2026

Shane Garduno

Shane Garduno

VP Client Success, LucyRx
Best Practices
woman and doctor

When we introduce the LucyRx Women’s Health Benefit to employers, a familiar line often comes first:

“We know we should be doing more for women in midlife. We just cannot afford a disruptive overhaul.”

The good news: you do not need to blow up your plan to support menopause in a meaningful way. You do need a prescription care partner that treats menopause as a core benefit, not a side project.

From Client Success, that is the gap we focus on every day.

What employers are seeing

Approximately 1.3 million women in the U.S. enter menopause each year, and about 20% of the workforce is in some phase of the menopause transition.¹  These are not early-career employees. They are managers, directors, executives and key specialists.

Research from Bank of America and the National Menopause Foundation shows that:²

  • About half of peri- and post-menopausal women say menopause has had at least some negative impact on their work
  • Only 14% believe their employer recognizes the need for menopause-related benefits

Carrot Fertility’s menopause workplace reporting adds that 80% of respondents view menopause as a workplace challenge, yet only a small share feel well supported.³

For HR and finance teams, this shows up as:

  • Presenteeism and absenteeism
  • Avoided promotions and quiet exits
  • Unclear trends in midlife women’s health spend

Most leaders I speak with feel that tension. They know there is a gap. They are not always sure how to address it without creating a new layer of complexity.

Why a PBM-led approach matters

Education sessions and manager toolkits help normalize the conversation. They are important. But most of the levers that affect access, affordability and clinical appropriateness live inside the pharmacy benefit.

If a PBM’s standard design:

  • Excludes many hormone therapies
  • Treats menopause drugs as low-priority or “nice to have”
  • Lacks analytics to see midlife women as a distinct risk segment

…then menopause support will always feel like a pilot, not a strategy.

That is the problem we set out to solve with the LucyRx Women’s Health Benefit.

How implementation actually works

From a Client Success perspective, we designed the benefit to be simple to turn on and scalable over time.

1) Activation inside the existing LucyRx plan

For most groups, coverage is turned on by default with an effective date on or after January  1, 2026, with the option to customize or opt out.

2) Optional customization

Some clients run with the standard configuration. Others adjust tiers, member cost share or clinical rules for hormone and non-hormonal menopause therapies. We walk through scenarios so CFOs can see the cost and trend implications before decisions are final.

3) Configuration, testing and dashboards

Our teams configure the formulary and rules, test claims behavior and stand up LucyIQ dashboards so you can see utilization, adherence and symptom-management patterns from the start.

4) Communication support

We provide HR-ready communications that explain menopause support in clear, inclusive language and reduce stigma rather than amplify it. That helps employees understand what is available and how to use it.

What employees actually experience

For members, the experience should feel like having someone in their corner.

A typical scenario:

  • LucyIQ flags a midlife woman whose pattern of sleep medications and anxiety prescriptions suggests possible unmanaged menopause
  • A menopause-trained Care Guide reaches out, explains the possible connection and walks through available therapies and out-of-pocket costs
  • The Care Guide helps her prepare for a prescriber visit, navigate prior authorization if needed and enroll in any applicable affordability programs
  • Follow-up ensures the new regimen is working and adjusts support if needed

The goal is not to replace her clinician. It is to make sure the pharmacy benefit does not become another barrier and that she can act on evidence-based options.

What HR and finance teams see

From the employer lens, we focus on three outcomes.

1) Clarity on cost and trend

LucyIQ separates appropriate use from waste, highlights duplicative symptom-management drugs and tracks trends in key women’s health therapies. That gives you a view into how this benefit is affecting total cost of care over time.

2) Confidence in clinical quality and equity

Coverage decisions align with guidelines rather than pure rebate economics. This matters to CHROs and CFOs who are increasingly asked to explain not only what the plan covers, but why.

3) Proof this is more than a “nice to have”

Over time, employers can see changes in adherence, reductions in unnecessary medications and more appropriate use of menopause therapies. Those patterns support a strong story about productivity, retention and equity for midlife women.

Questions to ask any PBM about menopause

Whether you partner with LucyRx or not, your PBM should be able to answer these questions:

  • Which menopause-related therapies are covered in your standard formulary, and how are they tiered?
  • How do you identify midlife women who may have unmet menopause needs?
  • Do you offer trained clinicians or Care Guides to support them, or only digital tools?
  • What reporting do you provide that links menopause support to utilization, medical trend and workforce outcomes?
  • How will you help us communicate these benefits in a way that reduces stigma?

If the answers are vague, menopause is probably not embedded in their operating model.

A practical path forward

In Client Success, our job is to make sure your pharmacy strategy lines up with your values and your business reality. Menopause support is one of the places where those two things intersect.

You do not need a separate platform or a major overhaul to start. You need a prescription care partner that:

  • Recognizes menopause as a workforce and equity issue
  • Embeds support into the core pharmacy benefit
  • Measures impact in a way HR and finance can stand behind

That is what we built the LucyRx Women’s Health Benefit to do.

Make menopause support real

LucyRx helps employers embed menopause support into the pharmacy benefit without disruption. Contact us to learn how we help turn intention into action.

Contact Us

Tags

Menopause in the workplace Pharmacy benefit strategy Women’s health benefits

Sources

1World Economic Forum & McKinsey Health Institute. Closing the women’s health gap: A $1 trillion opportunity to improve lives and economies. 2024.
2Bank of America & National Menopause Foundation. Break through the stigma: Menopause in the workplace. 2023.
3Faubion SS et al. Impact of menopause symptoms on women in the workplace. Mayo Clinic Proceedings. 98(6), 2023.
4Fawcett Society. Menopause and the Workplace. 2022; Penn Leonard Davis Institute, 2025.
5AARP Public Policy Institute & NORC. Women in Menopause Often Go Untreated. 2025.
6Wolff J. “What Doctors Don’t Know About Menopause.” AARP The Magazine. 2018.
7Kling JM et al. Menopause Management Knowledge in Postgraduate Residents. Mayo Clinic Proceedings. 94(11), 2019.
8Bank of America. “BofA Report Finds 64% of Women Want Menopause-Specific Benefits, Yet Only 14% Believe Their Employer Recognizes the Need for Them.” 2023.
9Society for Women’s Health Research. EMPACT Menopause in the Workplace Fact Sheet. 2024.
10Carrot Fertility. Menopause in the Workplace 2024. 2024.

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