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Do you feel like something isn't right with your legs, but can't find answers?
Or perhaps you've been diagnosed with early stage lipoedema but having challenges with understanding how to manage it?
You've landed in the right place.
Navigate Lipoedema is a resource dedicated to helping women with suspected early stage lipoedema reach earlier diagnosis and treatment earlier.
Free Short Learning Program
Three short lessons and a printable workbook to get you heard sooner, build a treatment plan that fits your symptoms, and test treatments properly. It will only take about 20 minutes, and is completely free.
Advocacy · October 2026
By Toni Morrow, Founder
We pay into Medicare like everyone else. Yet the surgery for lipoedema has no item number and is labelled cosmetic. My submission to the Senate Select Committee on Women’s Health shows what that exclusion costs: an estimated $6.5 billion a year, and women shut out of the big-data research that is speeding up diagnosis for other diseases. Women are expected to accept less. It’s exploitative, and it has to change.
Lipoedema is a disease of the loose connective tissues (LCT), and is a complex chronic condition characterised by abnormal distribution and buildup of painful fat and connective tissue in the extremities. It's a genetic condition that almost exclusively affects women.
The abnormal fat distribution often causes a distinctive 'column-like' shape to the legs, and the tissue is usually painful, bruises easily and characteristically full of 'nodules' that may feel like grains of rice, or walnuts. Legs often feel heavy and experience swelling. Leaky vessels cause a buildup of fluid in the tissue, causing the lymphatics to struggle with fluid clearance. This fluid causes chronic inflammation, which leads to the formation of fibrosis throughout the tissue.
Despite being first described in the 1940's, few physicians in Australia are aware of it and self-diagnosis is often the starting point for many women who have lipoedema.
Follow a structured 5-step process to navigate the path to diagnosis and treatment, based on real experience.
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Access a collection of research and resources to help you build your lipoedema management plan.
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Feeling overwhelmed? Get 1:1 hands-on help from someone who has been through the lipoedema diagnostic odyssey.
Book a WorkshopYour 5-Step Pathway
An overview of the five steps that take you from first symptoms to a plan you can act on. Each step is covered in full on the Make a Plan page.
Step 1
Step 2
Step 3
Step 4
Step 5
A major trial published in The Lancet has found that liposuction relieves lipoedema pain far better than conservative therapy alone. Here is what it found, what it doesn’t show yet, and what it should mean for Australian women.
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More than a million Australian women are estimated to have lipoedema. Medicare has no item number for the surgery that treats it, so women pay the full cost themselves.
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Could your skincare and activewear be affecting lipoedema progression? New research on endocrine-disrupting chemicals reveals surprising connections between everyday products and hormone-driven adipose disorders. Evidence-based guidance for reducing exposure.
Read MoreLipoedema insights and updates straight to your inbox.
Free short learning program
Self-advocacy is simply knowing what to say, and what to show, so your symptoms are taken seriously. Our free Self-Advocacy program walks you through it in a few short lessons, with a workbook you can take to your appointment.
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