Doing Harm: The Truth About How Bad Medicine and Lazy Science Leave Women Dismissed, Misdiagnosed, and Sick

by Maya Dusenbery

But gender stereotypes have a tendency to put women in double binds, and this one is no exception. Since women are expected to have an overly emotional response to pain, they are at risk of having their reports not taken seriously whether they adhere to the stereotype or break with it. Dr. Vicki Ratner brings a unique dual perspective to the problem as an orthopedic surgeon and an advocate for patients with interstitial cystitis. She’s blunt about the dilemma women patients face: “It’s very difficult for a woman to present in a doctor’s office. Because if she’s very stoic—if she talks about the problem in the tone that I’m talking to you—then the doctor’s going to think, ‘Oh, there’s nothing really wrong with her.’ And then if she gets very emotional, he’s going to blame it on, ‘Oh, she’s a psychological mess blah blah blah.’ You get judged right away because you’re female: you’re either stoic and nothing’s wrong or you’re crying and you get labeled hysterical.” Conversely, the expectation that men keep a stiff upper lip when they’re in pain serves to ensure that they’re likely to be taken seriously no matter what: if they’re stoic, they’re just being a typical “macho” guy, and if they’re emotional, well, then it must be really, really bad. However, just how much leeway men have to break with the stoic male stereotype and still be taken seriously may depend on how closely they adhere to masculine norms in other ways. In a 2014 study that found female heart attack patients ...