Why don’t doctors trust women?

laoisgem

Am I the only one shocked to learn that women weren't included in clinical trials until 1990's?

https://www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/health-family/why-don-t-doctors-trust-women-the-answer-turns-out-to-be-quite-simple-1.4005141

I really don't want this tread to decend into a male/female bias debate but I was taken aback by the stats in this article.

An ‘author’, promoting a book to fools happy enough to buy both it and her agenda.

A boring windbag piping the same tune we’re all sick and tired of hearing by now.

mikhail

laoisgem wrote: »

Am I the only one shocked to learn that women weren't included in clinical trials until 1990's?

I'd guess this was partly an attempt to remove a confounding variable from trials, and possibly an old-fashioned attempt to shield women from the dangers of medical trials. Of course, it has lead to the kinds of deficiencies of knowledge the article mentions, which are slowly being put right. Yeah, our culture is a bit screwy in relation to women, and was significantly worse in living memory.

B0jangles

80 per cent of pain medication has been tested only on men. Even in preclinical trials with cell lines and rodents, males have been favoured over females.

Researchers have justified this bias by claiming that oestrous cycles in female rodents – and menstrual cycles in human women – would potentially corrupt results. If that were so, wouldn’t it be quite important to find out before selling the drug to women? Eight of the 10 prescription drugs taken off the market by the US Food and Drug Administration between 1997 and 2000 owing to severe adverse effects caused greater health risks in women than men. A 2018 study found this was a result of “serious male biases in basic, preclinical, and clinical research”.

That's bloody terrifying - they realised that the menstrual cycle affects how the medication behaves so they 'eliminated' the issue by simply not testing on women at all?

y0ssar1an22

here's a good vid on the topic

chunkylover4

mikhail wrote: »

I'd guess this was partly an attempt to remove a confounding variable from trials, and possibly an old-fashioned attempt to shield women from the dangers of medical trials. Of course, it has lead to the kinds of deficiencies of knowledge the article mentions, which are slowly being put right. Yeah, our culture is a bit screwy in relation to women, and was significantly worse in living memory.

That and the problems that came from thalidomide, it was an over correction of a problem. Freakonomics do a good podcast on it in a series called bad medicine.

jam_mac_jam

Very interesting article. Might read the book.

I remember reading that heart attacks present in women quite differently in women leading to them being undiagnosed due to the fact doctors are taught how they present in men. Men are the default in many things causing all sorts of problems to women, safety gear, seat belt tests for cars.
Also autism is undiagnosed in some women as its seen as a male disease and high functioning women may not be diagnosed.

jam_mac_jam

JayZeus wrote: »

An ‘author’, promoting a book to fools happy enough to buy both it and her agenda.

A boring windbag piping the same tune we’re all sick and tired of hearing by now.

The agenda that women should have adequate health care, that absolute bitch.


Did you even read any of the article at all? Or just come in to whine like a baby as women were mentioned?

biko

So the answer to "Why don’t doctors trust women?" is that they are mainly men, and we need more women doctors that experiment on women?

Another common answer is that men have been students and soldiers longer, and these two groups are often used to experiment on as they are young and healthy.

But yes, we do need diversity in clinical tests.

I imagine it would be to remove as many variables as possible. A woman's period may skew results.

Or just good old fashioned sexism.

eviltwin

jam_mac_jam wrote: »

Also autism is undiagnosed in some women as its seen as a male disease and high functioning women may not be diagnosed.

My daughter's autism wasn't diagnosed until her late teens because our former male GP said women can't be autistic.

Women's pain is routinely dismissed and the physical impact of menstruation and pregnancy treated as part of being a woman. When I was having my kids the overwhelming attitude was that once your child is healthy then you shouldn't complain.

It's improving but slowly

jam_mac_jam

jam_mac_jam wrote: »

The agenda that women should have adequate health care, that absolute bitch.

Did you even read any of the article at all? Or just come in to whine like a baby as women were mentioned?

I read the entire article. A waste of time. Yet another complaint about inequality based on a laypersons uneducated opinion about the pharmaceutical industry, heavily biased by her own perception of how she and other women have suffered as a consequence.

She published a book and now an opinion piece blaming men for complying with the established procedures for gaining regulatory approval of medicines. It won’t make a blind bit of difference, except to raise her profile and sell some books.

Her efforts would be better directed towards the women working in the relevant specialist medical professions and pharma companies along with political representatives and those who can directly influence legislation.

Until she’s done that, she’s just a whinger looking to blame men for something else.

Yawn.

Kidchameleon

Women lie an awful lot. Men tend to be more upfront and honest in my experience.

LirW

eviltwin wrote: »

My daughter's autism wasn't diagnosed until her late teens because our former male GP said women can't be autistic.

Women's pain is routinely dismissed and the physical impact of menstruation and pregnancy treated as part of being a woman. When I was having my kids the overwhelming attitude was that once your child is healthy then you shouldn't complain.

It's improving but slowly

Many procedures that are related to the female reproductive system and involve pain are also met with a "suck it up" attitude.
While I know that pain levels vary, there is no routine pain relief offered for an IUD insertion. For everyone who doesn't know, someone's basically shoving something up through your cervix into your uterus that a cervix that's not going through pregnancy has no interest in. For some women this pain is so bad it puts them off going back to ever do it again.
I had a cervical biopsy before without any pain relief (not in Ireland though). I genuinely needed a while a get over a Lletz treatment mentally, it was a terrifying experience.

The average time to get a diagnosis for Endometriosis is 12 years(!). If young girls suffer from gynecological problems they're either fobbed off with "it's normal" or "take that pill, it might get better".
I didn't realize that my pain and bleeding weren't normal until I was 20, I had absolutely no comparison and the general consensus is that it's supposed to hurt, part of the game.

Women develop different symptoms for different diseases, even very common ones yet are more likely to be sent home without treatment.

I could go on, this is a topic very close to home for me.

odyssey06

Do doctors trust men? I don't think its a matter of trust or not. Men are more predictable perhaps \ known quantity \ less confusing factors... in a nutshell, simpler.

There seems to be a lot more that can go wrong with a woman, more conditions and illnesses.

laoisgem

odyssey06 wrote: »

Do doctors trust men? I don't think its a matter of trust or not. Men are more predictable perhaps \ known quantity \ less confusing factors... in a nutshell, simpler.

There seems to be a lot more that can go wrong with a woman, more conditions and illnesses.

I agree, I think possibly the title is misleading by saying doctors don't trust women. I think that more needs to be done with regards to investigating the female body so doctors do have a better understanding. At present we are a long way off!

eviltwin

odyssey06 wrote: »

Do doctors trust men? I don't think its a matter of trust or not. Men are more predictable perhaps \ known quantity \ less confusing factors... in a nutshell, simpler.

There seems to be a lot more that can go wrong with a woman, more conditions and illnesses.

I'd agree with respect to general practice perhaps but not so in the maternity system. These people are working in the area of female reproductive health, it's their area of expertise and yet they are routinely dismissive of their patients.

miamee

For those thinking this is just some woman trying to sell her book - it's an issue that has been reported on long before she wrote it. Here are a couple of examples though I am sure there are probably more.

From 2015
How Doctors Take Women's Pain Less Seriously

When my wife was struck by mysterious, debilitating symptoms, our trip to the ER revealed the sexism inherent in emergency treatment.

From 2018
Pain bias: The health inequality

When they’re in pain, women wait longer in emergency departments and are less likely to be given effective painkillers than men. BBC Future investigates for our new series the Health Gap.

In 2009, my doctor told me that, like “a lot of women”, I was paying too much attention to my body. Saying there wasn’t an issue, he suggested I just relax and try to ignore the symptoms.

Ignore the syptoms aka go away and stop annoying me aka stop being so dramatic, you're grand woman :rolleyes:

I remember as a 16 year old being sent to A&E after a particularly bad bout of food poisoning. I was dehydrated but still couldn't keep anything down. While asking me about the vomiting, how I was feeling etc. I told the doctor that I was getting a very sharp pain in my side when throwing up. Period pain, he told me. I didn't have my period and told him so. Oh women can get period pain at any time...wtf. At 16 I wasn't confident enough to tell him that he was talking through his backside but he was fobbing me off with 'it must be a woman thing cos I can't think of anything else'.