Women 'get worse heart treatment than men': medical sexism. - Women reporting the same symptoms as men are taken less seriously by doctors.

Extract from a Telegraph health article which appeared on 14th November 2007 but for which I can no longer find a link:

"Women with heart problems are less likely to receive as good treatment and examinations as men, a study has found.

Fewer female heart patients receive effective medication to improve their health and reduce their chances of dying from their condition, an analysis of data collected by the Healthcare Commission shows.

Women admitted to hospital with heart failure were also significantly less likely to have received the most effective tests to diagnose their condition."

This has long been known... - In 1973 researchers, Lennane and Lennane, wrote a seminal paper on medical sexism - about how when women reported physical symptoms of potentially serious health conditions they were less likely to be physically examined, tested and treated, than men reporting the same symptoms, because doctors had a stereotypical negative view of women patients and tended to regard women's symptoms as psychogenic, rather than physical. There have been many similar research research findings since then, and some medical schools have special elements - lectures from psychologists - in their courses to try to eliminate this sexism, which is so damaging to women patients. - Unfortunately the sexism continues...)o: - It is even present in this Healthcare Commission report itself! since they seem to want to lay the responsibility on the women patients, rather than on the doctors who are actually responsible: "Researchers, whose study is published in the journal Heart, are not sure why women with heart problems appear to be having a raw deal, but said part of the reason might be differences in the way they describe their symptoms to GPs."

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Sex and Power - Women remain seriously under-represented in senior positions

Sex and power

Extract from the report:

"A "sex and power" survey of women in senior positions across the public and private sector in Britain says that 30 years after the Sex and Discrimination Act, women should be sharing power more equally."

Well I've got a good idea to help with this problem: We need sexist attitudes to be eradicated from healthcare provision, ideally by meticulously thought-out legislation, banning medical sexist discrimination by statute. If women were to be treated with the same care and concern as men are by doctors and their retinues, then their health would be much better and that would remove one unnecessary obstacle to their advancement in the workplace.

In the '90s, Sheena McDonald presented television programmes about this, and The Times national newspaper carried detailed and serious articles highlighting with statistics and with personal testimonies the demeaning attitudes encountered by women patients consulting doctors, in contrast to male patients consulting them with the same symptoms. Men were much more likely to be taken seriously and to be examined and sent for tests; women were more likely to be considered to be exaggerating their symptoms or imagining them, and to be offered 'reassurance' or worse, and sent away, possibly with anti-depressants. There were, of course, grave consequences to this medical malpractice.

How we laughed - ruefully - when a typical greeting was parodied! - To a male patient: "Good morning. And what is the matter?" - To a woman patient: "Good morning. And what seems to be the matter?" - But the parody is still all too close to the truth, and the humour is all too black and all too many women are harmed by this nonsense...)o:

And if you think that sex discrimination in medical services is within the remit of the Equal Opportunities Commission, amazingly, you are wrong! - I brought up the matter with them in Manchester years ago and was told that although they do hear from women who know themselves to have received poor treatment from health professionals because of what I could these days call institutional sex prejudice, they cannot assist because medical services are outside their terms of reference.