When Christina Caron expressed her health problems, she felt that she was being ignored, due to her weight. She complained about her hurting elbow, but the doctors brushed it off and didn’t do anything.
“I went to my regular primary care doctor and she just sort of hand-waved it off as ‘Well, you’re overweight and it’s putting stress on your joints.” Caron said.
Christina got an x-ray, and it turned out that she had a chipped bone in her elbow.
This type of behavior is known as “Medical Gaslighting”, where medical concerns from people typically from the LGBTQ+ community, people of color, women, and other minority groups have been ignored. Studies have shown that women are more likely to be misdiagnosed with heart disease and other disorders than men, and in the health records of black people, doctors used words like “non-compliant” or “agitated” to describe them.
Gaslighting could happen to anyone at any time, so here are some things to watch out for when you go to your next doctor’s appointment:
1. When your doctor talks in a condescending way and de-emphasizes your pain.
2. When your doctor interrupts you and refuses to get a medical scan or any kind of lab confirmation.
3. When your doctor tells you that you have an illness but refuses to get you treatment or screening for that illness.
If you feel that you’re being gaslighted, you can keep specific notes, bring in a support friend, and make sure that before leaving the appointment, have your doctor figure out the next step to your treatment.
If nothing else works, try switching doctors or hospitals if possible, and contact the authorities.
“Any instances of abuse, manipulation, gaslighting, delaying diagnoses — those are reportable events that providers need to know about,” Dr. Mitchell said. “Doctors need to be held accountable.”
Source:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/29/well/mind/medical-gaslighting.html
“I went to my regular primary care doctor and she just sort of hand-waved it off as ‘Well, you’re overweight and it’s putting stress on your joints.” Caron said.
Christina got an x-ray, and it turned out that she had a chipped bone in her elbow.
This type of behavior is known as “Medical Gaslighting”, where medical concerns from people typically from the LGBTQ+ community, people of color, women, and other minority groups have been ignored. Studies have shown that women are more likely to be misdiagnosed with heart disease and other disorders than men, and in the health records of black people, doctors used words like “non-compliant” or “agitated” to describe them.
Gaslighting could happen to anyone at any time, so here are some things to watch out for when you go to your next doctor’s appointment:
1. When your doctor talks in a condescending way and de-emphasizes your pain.
2. When your doctor interrupts you and refuses to get a medical scan or any kind of lab confirmation.
3. When your doctor tells you that you have an illness but refuses to get you treatment or screening for that illness.
If you feel that you’re being gaslighted, you can keep specific notes, bring in a support friend, and make sure that before leaving the appointment, have your doctor figure out the next step to your treatment.
If nothing else works, try switching doctors or hospitals if possible, and contact the authorities.
“Any instances of abuse, manipulation, gaslighting, delaying diagnoses — those are reportable events that providers need to know about,” Dr. Mitchell said. “Doctors need to be held accountable.”
Source:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/29/well/mind/medical-gaslighting.html