
Q4W: Why do doctors and medical staff take women’s ailments less seriously?
There’s countless stories and news reports online specifically of women of all ages dying or nearly dying because doctors don’t take them seriously. A good example is this story right here, where doctors blatantly ignored this women’s abnormal ecg scan which led to her ultimate death. One of the medical directors even said if he was on duty that night that the woman would’ve been sent straight to cardiology. The death was completely preventable and problems were obvious yet trained medical staff thought doing nothing was the best option.
I tried finding similar stories about men but I didn’t find very much. I don’t know if it’s underreported by men (as they are less likely to see doctors anyway) or if doctors truly do take women’s health less seriously leading to many preventable deaths.
What causes this phenomenon and why are many health issues brought up by women dismissed as “dramatic” by medical professionals? Did you personally ever have issues with getting doctors to take you seriously?