Let’s start with this acknowledgement: For centuries, nearly all aspects of health care were created by — and designed for — men. Thankfully, the unique health care needs of women have been recognized and addressed. The same can be said for the unique needs of people of color, men and women.
All of that can be true, without taking away from this: men’s health care does have some unique challenges, some of which are discussed in the first Men’s Health special edition by BINJE.
Start with the numbers.
Men in New Jersey live, on average, nearly five fewer years than women. They die from heart disease at nearly 1.6 times the rate. They die from unintentional injury at more than two and a half times the rate, and from motor vehicle-related incidents at roughly three times the rate. These aren’t soft statistics or anecdotal impressions — they come directly from the New Jersey Hospital Association, and they tell a consistent story about where the gaps are sharpest.
None of that happens by accident.
Some of it is biology. Some of it is decades of cultural conditioning about what it means to be strong, stoic, and self-sufficient — the idea that admitting you’re struggling, physically or emotionally, is itself a kind of failure. And some of it is simply a health care system, and a marketing apparatus built around it, that hasn’t constructed the same on-ramps for men that it has for everyone else. Walk through a pharmacy aisle or watch an hour of cable television, and you’ll see plenty marketed toward men’s hair loss, men’s performance or men’s muscle mass. You’ll see far less marketed toward men’s mental health.
This section is our attempt to close part of that gap — not by lecturing men about what they should be doing, but by putting in front of them the people, programs and information that might actually move the needle.
Inside, you’ll find conversations with some of New Jersey’s leading physicians and behavioral health experts.
- A preventive cardiologist explains why one cholesterol number can mean the difference between managing heart disease and actually reversing it;
- Urologists explain why a two-minute prostate screening remains one of the hardest sells in medicine — and why a new AI-guided treatment is changing what happens next for men who are diagnosed;
- A psychologist walks through the biology — and the stigma — behind paternal postpartum depression, a condition that affects roughly 1 in 10 new fathers and goes almost entirely undiagnosed.
You’ll also meet the men working to close the gap directly: a behavioral health executive explaining why imposter syndrome often hits the most accomplished men hardest; a clinician who shares his own struggles to get other men talking; a retired Army colonel whose own cancer scare turned into a statewide mission to get veterans screened before it’s too late; and an outpatient behavioral health leader who says the most overlooked population in mental health isn’t teenagers — it’s middle-aged men who look perfectly fine right up until they aren’t.
You’ll find a guest column from one of New Jersey’s largest health systems on caring for gay and bisexual men, and real patient stories showing what’s possible when the right care meets the right moment.
This isn’t a competition for whose health challenges matter more. It’s simply a recognition that men’s challenges deserve their own spotlight, too — and that the first step toward solving any health crisis is making sure people know it exists.
