Overall Objective
The aim of the April 2010 ICOWHI conference is to look at urban planning with an eye for areas where it has particular potential for better supporting women’s health.  Far too often, everyone from health care professionals to policymakers to urban planners have conducted their work under the assumption that the needs of women are the same as the needs of men when structuring an environment conducive to promoting and preserving women’s health.  In fact, there are remarkable opportunities to have profound impact in meeting the unique needs of urban women by bringing together professionals from all facets of health care, health policy and urban design among others to open a multi-disciplinary dialog about their work.

Outcomes
The following are specific proposed outcomes for the 18th ICOWHI Congress on urbanization and women’s health:

1. Showcase models of interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral collaboration among urban women’s health researchers, urban planners, policy makers, clinicians, philosophers, and community workers from the Global South and Global North, and encourage interdisciplinary, cross-sectoral networking and collaboration.

2. Propose an agenda for urban women’s health that identifies general cross cutting items as well as strategies for specific localities.

3. Develop strategies for economically efficient delivery of health promotion, health education, and disease and injury prevention guidelines for urban women in the Global North and Global South.

4. Disseminate and communicate the recommendations for urban women’s health to key players in the global health, urban planning and urban finance fields by publishing articles and supplements in journals across the different disciplines, contribution to relevant world-wide web sites, and an edited volume of the white papers and selected key presentations from the Congress.