Over the past several months, there has been a great deal of reporting that women and minorities are more likely than white males to be the victims of poor health care. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/medical-mistakes-are-likely-women-minorities-rcna133726
According to researchers, women and racial and ethnic minorities are 20-30% more likely than white men to experience a misdiagnosis. Misdiagnosis rates range from 1.5% of heart attacks, 17.5% of strokes and 22.5% of lung cancers. https://qualitysafety.bmj.com/content/33/2/109
Dr. David Newman-Toker, professor of neurology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and lead author of the BMJ study said this disparity was “significant and inexcusable.”
Yet another study concluded that women who area treated by female doctors are less likely to die or be readmitted when treated by female doctors. https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-care/women-are-less-likely-die-treated-female-doctors-study-suggests-rcna148254
The reasons for the disparities are unclear, but the article pointed to miscommunication, misunderstanding and bias. In addition, it appears that medical students receive limited training in women's health issues.
An extensive study found that “women are still more vulnerable to gender-biased diagnosing and ‘medical psychologizing' than men. They are more likely to receive psychogenic diagnoses and have their physical symptoms attributed to stress or anxiety, even in the absence of any evidence of psychological illness or distress.” https://journals.library.columbia.edu/index.php/cjgl/article/view/5701/2780
These problems are systemic, and solutions include changing medical education, including women and minorities in the medical profession, enlightening medical professionals to the biases and prejudices that exist and promoting a system that treats all with the utmost care.
At Schmidt, Sethi & Akmajian, we recognize the disparities in medical care and pursue every case with vigor to obtain the best possible result.
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